Photo How To

Valentine’s Day is just a few days away, but there’s still time enough for you to parlay your digital photography skills into a memorable gift so you don’t find yourself buying a dozen haggard, mismatched roses at the all-night gas station (again).

There are many photography businesses today successfully using online and social media marketing tools and techniques to make sales. But converting followers or web visitors to actual clients is still more art than science. We interviewed a group of market-savvy photographers to learn their tips on how to best promote your photography on the web. Thanks to our contributors: Marguerite Beaty, Crea8fotos; Lukas Dryja, CEO and Co-Founder of Format.com; Brian McMillen, BKM Photography; and Ian L. Sitren, Second Focus.

This smart video below from DSLR Video Shooter easily walks viewers through the process of how to build a card reader/hard drive RAID enclosure, or editing hub, for working on (and storing) your photos and videos.

This amazing image might look like it was shot on a different planet but it was actually captured in commercial photographer Michelle Monique’s living room for her first paid gig back in 2009.

You have common sense enough to know that you need a spare battery, high capacity memory cards, USB card reader and, for sure, a subscription to Shutterbug, so we won’t restate the obvious. But there are a few other things you really should have to maximize the fun and function of your new camera.

Hi everybody! Welcome to my new Q&A column here in Shutterbug—a magazine I’ve been reading, and been a fan of, for so many years—so it’s truly an honor to be here with you. I invite you to send in your questions to editorial@shutterbug.com (with “For Scott Kelby” as the subject line), and I’ll do my best to answer them in Ask a Pro. Now on to this month’s questions.

He lives in a historic California gold-mining town about an hour out of San Diego, so the props for Ed Masterson’s Old West images are easy to come by: a barrel borrowed from a nearby winery, a pistol from a friend’s gun collection, a book from an antique shop, weathered wood from old barns nearby, and so on.