Architectural Photography Almanac
A resource for working professional photographers and design industry professionals featuring news, commentary, equipment resources, and original articles
When you’re first starting out in the industry, you have a million and two questions racing through your mind. This is great because it shows that you’re interested and looking to learn more! Most teachers will probably tell you that there are no stupid questions. In most cases, this is true — although — there are a number of reasons why certain questions should be avoided.
In his recently published book, Beautified China: The Architectural Revolution, Belgian photographer Kris Provoost carefully curates dozens of the nation’s most spectacular architectural wonders. Focused on showcasing iconic projects dating back to the lead-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, the book is a photo essay providing an abstracted, stylized glimpse into some of the China’s boldest, most dynamic buildings that collectively make up what Provoost dubs ‘the architectural revolution.’
From the stairs that Rocky Balboa ran in his training montage, to homes of Hollywood celebrities, to some of the most iconic public projects in the world, Black and African American architects have designed many of the architectural icons and integral buildings that we see and use every day.
What are the elements that build a photographer’s personal vision? In this lecture Dutch artist and photographer Bas Princen shares his thoughts on how experiences, previous photographs, text and visual references converge into one final image.
Bas Princen’s work has a special emphasis on urban landscapes and the transformations they undergo throughout time.
When you’re obsessed with something, say, architectural photography, you can’t imagine a life without it, so you’re going to find a way to do it no matter what. Even in the midst of a pandemic, even if you have to use an awful camera, even if you just underwent back surgery.
In October 2019, I decided to take a break from work to address stubborn back pain that hadn’t gone away in about six years.
The majority of people entering the photography industry tend to ask questions mostly about gear. Questions tend to be about lenses, cameras and what they should buy first, and while the gear is important, actually learning how and what to shoot is far more important. In a video from 30X40 Design Workshop, architect Eric Reinholdt covers a number of important tips that are extremely valuable for beginner photographers.
For those of you that are just starting out in architectural photography, or thinking about joining the industry, you may have a lot of questions. Hopefully, the majority of those questions are about learning how to shoot as opposed to what to shoot with; however, the gear you use does still matter.
While we’ve all been stuck inside, London-Based photographer Luke O’Donovan has been hard at work curating an incredible lineup of photographers, critics, and architecture industry thought leaders to create the first ever ZoomedIn festival, a free global event targeted to those with an interest in photography and architecture.
Tripods are not the most glamorous bits of gear that many photographers own. In fact, I generally hate using a tripod. Not because it doesn’t produce the results I want, it’s just such a pain to carry around; especially the heavier ones which are also, unfortunately, the more useful ones.
There’s no time like the present to sharpen your understanding of architecture given the current times we are living in – with millions (billions?!) of us in lockdown around the world, the amount of resources being made available for free is staggering. One of them, the Harvard course “The Architectural Imagination” may be one of the best investments you can make during this downtime.
The Architecture & Design Film Festival (ADFF) is a US-based organization that curates and shows architectural themed films across various events in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they have announced a new program, ADFF: Online, which is the live screening of four architectural films across four days (16th to 19th April) with two broadcasts starting at 8pm ET and 8pm PT.
Architectural photography started for me as a hobby, but from the very beginning of the ‘photographing my hometowns cityscape‘ stage, I called my photography Facebook page György Palkó Architectural Photographer. That name led me to my first contract. Five years and many many jobs and clients later we moved into our new home last year.
Le Corbusier is one of my favourite 20th century architects not only for his brutalist architecture and how he integrated surrealism into his work as well. Even to this day his work continues to be revered by many Le Corb fans the world over. One of his most ambitious yet important project was the Chandigarh Capitol Complex project which came to fruition at the request of then Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.
As a professional airport architect, HOK‘s Peter Ruggiero designs airports for a living, and he has been hard at work for years to improve New York’s most notorious, and Joe Biden’s favorite airport, LaGuardia. So what actually goes into optimizing the design of an airport terminal? This incredible video walks us through the wildly complex process.
With over 800 staff working in five offices spanning the globe, RJ Models may be the undisputed leader in architectural model making. Countless major architects from Foster + Partners to Zaha Hadid to Arquitectonica and more have commissioned RJ to create models of their planned architectural projects.
In my previous article, I admitted to both using Lightroom’s HDR function and showing that it’s a viable solution for professional architectural photography. There are many benefits to post processing with this technique, because what you end up with is still a RAW file, you can play with white balance, shadows and highlights exactly like on a single capture, but with the extended dynamic range offered by a blended HDR file.
In February 2015, Canon released what I think is the best architectural camera made so far. Almost 5 years on and this camera is a little long in the tooth but in my view still the best camera you can buy for this specific type of photography. I’m aware some of you may want to point out the Sony options or Fujifilm medium format cameras, but, nothing comes close to how good the Canon 5DS R is.
One of my most memorable shoots of 2019 took place at a beautiful location in Beverly Hills, CA. An architectural masterpiece designed by Walker Workshop situated on a ridgetop in the famed Trousdale Estates neighborhood, this house was an absolute stunner and the project had been on my radar for a good 3-4 years before I actually got the chance to photograph it.
A recent article by Lexi Taciak discussed how we finally have the perfect podcast for architectural photographers, and the latest guest on the BAAM podcast was none other than APA’s founder Mike Kelley himself – and the insights he provides are invaluable.
Personally I enjoy listening to a podcast while I edit or write articles.
Usman Dawood
Dane Alonso
Justin Szeremeta
Lexi Taciak
Mike Kelley
Veeral Patel
György Palkó