Are you a skate photographer who's never been published and can't wait to break through? Now's your chance: Push.ca, in partnership with Vans, Color Magazine and Clubmumble.com, is searching for the best emerging skateboard photographers across Canada.
Photographers who've never been published in a skate magazine are invited to submit their best skate shots to Push.ca. The winner of the grand prize will be flown to Toronto for a private shoot with a Vans pro team skater, you'll also win $500 in Vans gear, and have your shot exhibited in the Push.ca First Photos Show among images selected from professional skate photographers. Plus, the winning shot will appear in an upcoming issue of Color Magazine.
All you have to do is register as a member of Push (or log in if you're already a registered user), then click over to the Photo section onPush.ca/skateboarding. From there, click on upload and post your photo on Push.
In addition to the overall winner, there will be five secondary prizes for the best shots in the following categories: Subject Matter, Best Quality, Overall Impact, Light and Colour, and Timing/Catch of Trick. The best shots will also appear in the Push.ca First Photos Show in Toronto (date and details coming soon), and the photographers who shot them will win a prize pack from Vans valued at $500. You can submit up to 10 photos (maximum 2 per week) until November 9th.
Photos will be judged by Brian Caissie (photo editor, Concrete Magazine), Dylan Doubt (photo editor, Color Magazine) and Bob Kronbauer (founder, ClubMumble.com).
Use our Facebook link to promote your shot, and encourage people to rate your photo and leave comments. We'll be promoting all of the entries in our First Photos blog on Push.ca, and we'll have plenty of great interviews, tips and articles from our judges and other photographers to keep you hyped.
If you want to enter for a chance to win, make sure you follow the Photo Submission Guidelines and Contest Rules.
If you have any questions, hit us up at:
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and we'll get back to you as quickly as possible. Good luck and enter now to win!
So you've been shooting for a while now, and have started to accumulate a nice collection of lenses, perhaps bodies, flashes and the likes. Nothing would be worse than losing all this equipment, having it stolen or broken, then having to pay out of your pocket to replace it all. You've read it online in these forums, or another forum, "some asshole stole my stuff, please keep an eye on craigslist etc etc", it's the worst feeling in the world, and it will most likely happen to you, unless you're extremely careful. It happened to me, it happened to a lot of photographers that I know.
My scenario was a common one, I was walking around with my equipment in a Lowepro bag in Montreal about 8 years ago, I returned to my car, put the camera bag in the trunk (safe right?), drove off, parked somewhere else downtown, then went for dinner. Someone who obviously makes their living off of this type of theft, apparently followed me (assumption) after seeing me place the camera gear in my car, and waited for me to park again. Once parked, I can only assume that as a professional it took less than 20 seconds to smash my window, pop the trunk, take the bag, and walk off. Total cost for me was a Canon EOS 1V-HS, 15mm fisheye lens, 50mm and a junky sigma 70-200. If I had insurance, I could have gotten new equipment, for a fraction of the price. Lessons learned.
Some tips for preventing theft
- never ever leave your gear unattended
- don't open your camera bag at your car, or play around with your gear and leave some of it behind
- if you're out to shoot, you're out to shoot, don't leave your bag with a bro while you skate around
- purchase non-traditional camera company bags, a Dakine sequence or a Burton zoom is more discrete than a Lowepro bag.
- don't decal your car with your photography logo, or advertising photography services
- don't park your car anywhere with your camera gear in it, ever.
Insurance
If you're not shooting commercially you can get your gear insured fairly easily by adding it to your homeowners/home renters plan for a couple of extra dollars a month. Keep in mind if you go this route and start making money from photography, when you make your claim, the insurance company will no doubt do an audit and discover you're making money from the equipment and void your policy.
If you are shooting commercially then it's best to find an insurance agent that specializes in insurance for photographers. There are a couple of companies out there that specialize in just this thing:
* I don't have any experience with these companies.
Discuss this article - post links to more insurance companies etc
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 Lets get started with the basics, your name, age, and location?
Erik Seo, 33, Salt Lake City, Utah
What kind of gear are you rocking these days?
Nikon Cameras, lenses, speedlights, Elinchrom and Alien Beees lighting, F-Stop camera bags and Taylor Made R7 Driver/3 Wood, Wilson Staff Irons, Tommy Armour wedges.
What got you started shooting? How many years has it been now?
I always had some interest in photography since grade school, I thought cameras were cool. I got my first camera in college, which was 12 years ago. I've been shooting full-time for 8 years now.
Read more...
 Lets start off with the basics, your name, your age, and your home base?
My name is Andrew Norton, I am 22 years young and I live in Toronto.
What got you started in photography? When & why did you pick up your first camera?
I got started shooting photos by picking up my dad’s old SLR camera that was sitting in the closet collecting dust. It was a Nikon FE and it had a 50mm 1.8 lens (still use that thing now). That camera had no shutter speeds, it was basically always stuck on aperture priority which at first was good for messing around and learning on. Got a little tricky when I wanted to advance my skills a bit though. I just sort of did what everyone does when they start, shoot photos of things around me and try to re-create stuff I liked and figure out all the different functions of the camera.
I understand you went to school for photography in Toronto, did you stick that out? Do you think it benefited you at all?
Read more...
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Here's the premise, you've got a great spot it's close to the end of the day, and there is a lot of sun. The sun also happens to be on the other side of the spot that you're shooting, which casts some pretty nasty shadows and makes exposing the sky properly very hard. What we want to do is fill in the shadows of the spot, and expose the sky so that we have a nice shade of blue. So I've put together a few steps and some photos that show you how you can go about achieving a properly exposed photo with some good colour dynamics.
