PhotoActive
A podcast about photography and the Apple ecosystem.
Displaying Episode 1 - 10 of 171 in total of PhotoActive with the tag “photography”.
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Episode 194: iPhone 17 and Apple’s Fall Event
September 12th, 2025 | 41 mins 39 secs
apple, apple event, cameras, iphone, iphone 17, iphone 17 pro, iphone air, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
The new iPhone models are here, a yearly event that we look forward to mostly to see what Apple has done with the iPhone cameras. Does a 48 megapixel telephoto camera capable of 8x zoom appeal to you enough to buy a new iPhone Pro? Is the svelte shape of the new iPhone Air compelling enough to pay more for, despite it having just one camera and less battery life? Or did you see the Cosmic Orange color of the iPhone 17 Pro and made your decision immediately based on that? We look at what Apple announced and what we’re looking forward to.
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Episode 193: Photography Police and Google Pro Res Zoom
September 6th, 2025 | 29 mins 49 secs
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, pixel 10 pro, podcast, pro res zoom
Are you following the proper rules of photography, or are you at risk of being busted by the photography police? Maybe you’re shooting photos out of focus, or introducing light leaks, or using direct flash. All of these can be considered “bad” photography, but they’re also currently popular styles of shooting. Also in this episode, Jeff talks about his experience with the Google Pixel 10 Pro XL and its Pro Res Zoom feature that uses generative AI to clean up images shot at up to 100x zoom.
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Episode 192: Process, Product, and Problem Solving
August 18th, 2025 | 33 mins 14 secs
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
Are you taking photos for yourself, or are you feeding the social media algorithms for brief dopamine hits when someone praises your images? In this episode, Kirk and Jeff ruminate on how the endless scroll of images is affecting how we enjoy and make photos. And we ask ourselves: what do we really want to photograph?
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Episode 191: Macro Photography
August 1st, 2025 | 30 mins 21 secs
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, macro photography, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
Don’t know what to photograph? No vacation plans? With macro photography, you can get great results literally in your back yard. What was once a style of photography that required specialized gear is now something you can do well with just your phone — though of course there’s plenty of gear available if you want to go deeper into it.
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Episode 190: Fuji X-Half, AI Scaling, and Lightroom Changes
July 21st, 2025 | 31 mins 47 secs
apple, cameras, fuji x-half, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, om systems, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
Fujifilm’s new X-Half camera is a curious hybrid: a digital camera with analog feel but a modern price. We also discuss news of OM Systems possibly using AI upscaling in future cameras to boost resolution and look at a few changes in the latest versions of Lightroom.
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Episode 189: Traveling with a Camera
July 4th, 2025 | 34 mins 50 secs
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, travel photography
It’s the night before you leave for vacation and you need to choose which camera gear goes and stays. Do you reach for the 300mm telephoto, knowing it can get great photos but is large and bulky? Or do you take the smallest camera you can carry to ensure you have it with you at all times? And what else needs to come along? In this episode, Jeff and Kirk think about being on vacation, equipment they’ve taken on past trips, and what they would take now.
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Episode 188: WWDC 2025
June 13th, 2025 | 30 mins 10 secs
apple, cameras, ios 26, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, liquid glass, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, wwdc
Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference is always the first glimpse at what we can look forward to with new Apple software, including a peek at the photo capabilities of the next iPhones. And with iOS 26 and the Liquid Glass interface, things are going to look a lot different in the fall.
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Episode 187: Checking In on AI in Photography
May 31st, 2025 | 33 mins 52 secs
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
We know, it seems like we just talked about AI in photography, but the field is moving pretty fast. Google announced improvements to their generative AI models, which are both impressive and sloppy at the same time. We also look at new AI-based landscape masking tools in Lightroom, speculate on what WWDC could bring to Apple’s Photo app, and more.
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Episode 186: A Surrender: Markus Naarttijärvi and Daniel Agee
May 16th, 2025 | 42 mins 18 secs
a surrender, apple, cameras, daniel agee, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, markus naarttijärvi, photo book, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast
It’s another photo book! We’re joined by photographer Markus Naarttijärvi and publisher Daniel Agee to talk about Markus’s new book A Surrender. When we last talked to Daniel, he was at photo service Glass, but now he’s struck out on his own to form the publishing company Good Fight, and A Surrender is the first title.
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Episode 185: Quintin Lake’s Book The Perimeter
May 2nd, 2025 | 35 mins
apple, cameras, iphone, jeff carlson, kirk mcelhearn, lenses, photo book, photo editing, photo organization, photography, podcast, quintin lake, the perimeter
Quintin Lake traversed the Coast of Britain over several years, photographing and documenting the journey. Now, he’s turned his well-received project into a new photo book called The Perimeter. We welcome Quintin back to PhotoActive not just as a guest, but as an in-person guest with Kirk in his house in the UK.