Buying Guides

Every photographer, both amateur and professional, has at one time or another rested their camera on a rock, a crumpled coat, or some other handy object when they didn’t have access to a more traditional camera support. You might need to do this when you want to get into a photo yourself or when you can’t hold a camera steady in low light. Many tripods are too big and heavy to carry with you at all times. But here we have a collection of tabletop and miniature tripods that are so small and compact you can keep one with you every day. They also make great gifts for photographers who seem to have everything else.

Sooner or later the kids fly the coop, you find yourself an "empty-nester" and there you are with an attic filled with tchotchkes you know you'll never use again. Even if you haven't reached that stage in your life, there's another school of thought that says if you own more than 100 things, you've got too much. Ring any bells? If so, it's time to set up a  tchotchke-shooting table, photograph the stuff and sell it online because you know somebody out there is desperately looking for all those gewgaws you've been tripping over.

Professional photographic gear and other electronic equipment is expensive and delicate. But you already knew that. When you’re carrying your own gear you can afford to be as careful with it as possible. But once you hand off your gear to someone else—airport baggage handlers, limo drivers, overnight couriers, and the like—the only thing safeguarding your gear is the case you put it in. If you have anything worth protecting you should do it the way the pros do—with Pelican hard cases.

Add-on and converter lenses are camera accessories that often get lost in the shuffle. It’s easy to identify the need for an extra memory card, a camera case, an extra battery, a dedicated flash or in the case of an SLR, an additional lens or three as add-on options for your camera.

The built-in microphones on portable digital recorders are great for recording ambient sounds and live music, and their line-level inputs are really handy when you need to connect a mixer. But how about taking advantage of the external microphone input on your recorder? Using tiny lavalier microphones with portable digital recorders opens up a wide range of creative recording possibilities. Check out this article to learn about the interesting things you can do with this gear. 

When you get down to the nitty-gritty, you have to remember that a camera is a tool. It is designed to capture images, whether it be via light-sensitive film or a digital sensor. That’s what it needs to do. Camera designers have to approach design with extreme precision.

Before analog TV broadcasting bit the dust, portable TVs were often seen at a tailgate party or picnic, on a beach blanket or in the backyard. With the switch to digital broadcasting, set owners may as well use them as doorstops. Now, outdoor viewing is back with portable DTVs. With a digital tuner, antenna and rechargeable battery, a portable LCD TV takes advantage of free DTV channels in the air.