PhotoActive

Episode 208: DaVinci Resolve, Lightroom Killer?

27 Apr 2026

Contributed by Lukas

The well regarded video editor DaVinci Resolve just introduced a Photos module inside the app, making some people wonder whether the free software c...

Episode 207: Monochrome Sensors, DNG, and Apple 50th

12 Apr 2026

Contributed by Lukas

We remain fascinated by monochrome cameras, and this week we discovered just how tough it is to source the sensors used by the Ricoh GR IV Monochrome...

Episode 206: You Can’t Trust Photos Anymore

30 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

So it’s come to this. Generative AI has quickly gotten so good that it’s hard to distinguish real photos from generated ones. So where do we go fr...

Episode 205: Spec Goblins and the MacBook Neo

15 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Apple has announced the MacBook Neo, a $600 laptop running on the same A18 Pro processor that was used in the iPhone 16 Pro. Oh, and it has 8GB of RAM...

Episode 204: Storage Prices

02 Mar 2026

Contributed by Lukas

The prices of digital storage are set to climb this year because AI is eating up all the available inventory. And modern photography is entirely depen...

Episode 203: Do You Have $10,000 to Spare?

14 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

The best-selling compact camera in Japan is from... Kodak? We’ve talked about compact cameras in the past, but it remains a fascinating part of the ...

Episode 202: Episode 202: Pixelmator Pro Returns

03 Feb 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Now we know what Apple is doing with Pixelmator Pro after its acquisition of Pixelmator: it’s part of the new Apple Creator Studio bundle. Also, we ...

Episode 201: What’s Real

03 Jan 2026

Contributed by Lukas

Is your phone not accurately capturing the world around you? An article in the Guardian questions whether image processing in smartphones is making ph...

Episode 200: All Our Cameras

23 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Two Hundred episodes! To celebrate roughly seven and a half years of the PhotoActive podcast, Kirk and Jeff picked some favorite photos from the digit...

Episode 199: Vroom Vroom

08 Dec 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We get views into two very different types of photography in this episode. Jeff travels to Nevada for the Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix where the car...

Episode 198: I’m Not an Animal

29 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We’ve got several things to discuss in this episode, from little-known settings in the iPhone Camera app, to shooting panoramas, to the Leica M EV1 ...

Episode 197: Overenthusiastic in Your Opinion

03 Nov 2025

Contributed by Lukas

What started with a couple of new settings related to the iPhone Camera app quickly devolves into a discussion of Apple’s Liquid Glass effect in iOS...

Episode 196: Has Camera Tech Hit a Plateau?

20 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Has camera technology plateaued? We’re seeing technical advancements in image processing and autofocus, but what about the core parts like sensors? ...

Episode 195: Hands On with the iPhone 17 Pro

03 Oct 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Fifty percent of the PhotoActive podcast got a new iPhone 17 Pro, which means one of us has been testing the new cameras and can report back with firs...

Episode 194: iPhone 17 and Apple’s Fall Event

12 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 ...

Episode 193: Photography Police and Google Pro Res Zoom

06 Sep 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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...

Episode 192: Process, Product, and Problem Solving

18 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 e...

Episode 191: Macro Photography

01 Aug 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Macro Photography Don’t know what to photograph? No vacation plans? With macro photography, you can get great results literally in your back yard. W...

Episode 190: Fuji X-Half, AI Scaling, and Lightroom Changes

21 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 ...

Episode 189: Traveling with a Camera

04 Jul 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 ...

Episode 188: WWDC 2025

13 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 ...

Episode 187: Checking In on AI in Photography

31 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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 ...

Episode 186: A Surrender: Markus Naarttijärvi and Daniel Agee

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

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...

Episode 185: Quintin Lake’s Book The Perimeter

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Quintin Lake traversed the Coast of Britain over several years, photographing and documenting the journey. Now, he’s turned his well-received projec...

Episode 184: US Tariffs and Camera Gear

11 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The US government has begun to impose high tariffs on goods brought in from nearly every country in the world. Since most camera gear is made in Japan...

Episode 183: Fujifilm GFX100RF, A Medium Format Walking Around Camera

04 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

With the bonkers success of the Fujifilm X100VI, it seemed only a matter of time before Fuji made a compact camera based around its GFX medium format ...

Episode 182: Photoshop on iPhone

24 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Adobe has released Photoshop for iPhone, a bonafide version of real Photoshop, not to be confused with Photoshop Express or other earlier variations. ...

Episode 181: Leica Lux Grip and App for iPhone

07 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Two episodes ago Jeff expressed cynicism about iPhone add-ons that try to make the phone more like a traditional camera. And yet here we are looking a...

Episode 180: David Young’s Brief History of Photography

22 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On this week’s episode we welcome David Young, photographer and author of the new book A Brief History of Photography: From the Very Beginning to th...

Episode 179: iPhone Camera Accessories

11 Feb 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Photographers love to accessorize their cameras, and the iPhone is no different. A case is one thing, but what about other photo-centric add-ons? Shou...

Episode 178: Photographing the LA Fires

24 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The recent devastating fires in Los Angeles have created a lot of fire photography, and some of it compelling both for its content and its artistry. W...

Episode 177: AI in Photography in 2025

10 Jan 2025

Contributed by Lukas

We’ve been looking at various AI-related photography topics in recent episodes, such as using the Clean Up feature in the Photos app to remove unwan...

Episode 176: Cleaning Up Libraries

13 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

As we wrap up 2024, we’re realizing our photo libraries have grown quite a bit—in Jeff’s case, almost filling his cloud storage. So as we antici...

Episode 175: What Is a Photo?

01 Dec 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Our recent discussions of AI and the Photos Clean Up tool have brought us full circle to the bigger question: What is a photo? Hosts: Jeff Carlson: we...

Episode 174: Photos Clean Up

18 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Untitled https://media24.fireside.fm/file/fireside-uploads-2024/images/d/d76bf7dc-58d3-4746-b5c1-17ac3c2b6d29/4B0e1A-4.jpg Aimless pedestrians wanderi...

Episode 173: iPhone Photo File Formats

04 Nov 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In our quest to better understand the often-confusing changes and additions to the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro photo situation, we’ve decided to tac...

Episode 172: Photographic Styles on the iPhone 16

18 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro introduce a new twist on an existing feature, and the result is... confusion and complexity. Photographic Styles can b...

Episode 171: iPhone 16 Pro Hands-On

04 Oct 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Now that Kirk and Jeff have received their iPhone 16 Pros, it’s time to take them into the world and see how the new photographic features work. Is ...

Episode 170: iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro

13 Sep 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s that time again: new iPhones! By which we mean, of course, new Apple Cameras That Also Do Other Stuff. Kirk and Jeff are both upgrading their p...

Episode 169: Peakto 2.0 with Matthieu Kopp

16 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Is your photo library spread out among different drives and apps? We’re not talking about maybe having a couple of Lightroom Classic catalogs—it’...

Episode 168: Image Stabilization

02 Aug 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Many cameras now feature IBIS: in-body image stabilization. But do you really need a stabilized body? Can you use just a stabilized lens? And for that...

Episode 167: Sensors and LUTs

19 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Touting Panasonic’s new LUMIX S9 camera, a representative was quoted saying that Micro Four Thirds sensors are more difficult to understand than ful...

Episode 166: Pentax 17 and Photo Social Apps

07 Jul 2024

Contributed by Lukas

If you're wondering whether film photography is really experiencing a resurgence in popularity, the announcement of the Pentax 17 is your answer. It's...

Episode 165: AI and Photography from WWDC

21 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) is where we learn about what’s coming in the company’s many operating systems, and this year was f...

Episode 164: M4 iPad Pro

03 Jun 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Apple has released the new M4-powered iPad Pro, and Kirk bought one straightaway. Is it worth buying for photographers? Plus, we mention what’s chan...

Episode 163: Photo Criticism

17 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Part of enjoying photography is understanding photography. What makes a “good” photo? How much of that is based on the circumstances around its cr...

Episode 162: Gear Acquisition Syndrome

03 May 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Gear Acquisition Syndrome (GAS) is a running joke among photographers (and musicians), but it's also a real thing that can spin us up with the desire ...

Episode 161: Nitro with Nik Bhatt

05 Apr 2024

Contributed by Lukas

Gentleman Coder Nik Bhatt returns to talk about Nitro, his all-new photo editor for macOS (and soon, iOS and iPadOS). As the successor to RAW Power, N...

Episode 160: Primed by Seeing

22 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

We were recently asked about where we find inspiration while making photos, which led Kirk and Jeff to muse on the idea of being primed to find photo ...

Episode 159: Fuji X100VI and the Appeal of Small Fixed-Lens Cameras

08 Mar 2024

Contributed by Lukas

The entire Internet - yes, the whole thing, trust us - is going crazy for the new Fujifilm X100VI compact fixed-lens camera. What’s the appeal of th...

Episode 158: AI Revisited

23 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

In five years, will our cameras look anything like today’s cameras? We’ve seen staggering advancements in AI technologies in photography, so in th...

Episode 157: Photos at the High End: Hasselblad 907x/CFV 100C

09 Feb 2024

Contributed by Lukas

What would you do with 100 megapixels? Jeff recently had the opportunity to shoot with the new Hasselblad 907x/CFV 100C, a medium format camera in the...

Episode 156: The Rescue Mission with Derrick Story

26 Jan 2024

Contributed by Lukas

It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking the photos on your old hard drives are perfectly safe. But are they really? Our guest Derrick Story need...

Episode 155: Favorites from The Photo Book

15 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

To wrap up the year, we thought we’d turn our attention to selections from The Photo Book, a massive, rich collection of photography from some of th...

Episode 154: Lens Blur

01 Dec 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It’s time to talk about the B-word again! Jeff couldn’t trick Kirk into saying “bokeh,” but this week we’re looking at a few ways to get bac...

Episode 153: M3 Macs

17 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The photographer’s dilemma rears again. Not only are we sometimes struck by gear acquisition syndrome when new cameras are announced, we run into it...

Episode 152: Android and AI

03 Nov 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Google’s Pixel phones are held up as the Android smartphones to follow, and their cameras are often pitted against the iPhone as examples of the sta...

Episode 151: iPhone 15 Hands On

13 Oct 2023

Contributed by Lukas

On the surface, making photos with the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro is relatively simple: pick a zoom level, pick a format (raw or not), and go. But as...

Episode 150: Episode 150: iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro

29 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Who wants to talk megapixels and tetraprisms? In this episode, recorded shortly after Apple announced the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro, Kirk and Jeff l...

Episode 149: Daniel Agee on Glass Year 2

01 Sep 2023

Contributed by Lukas

In episode 111, we talked to the founders of the photo app and community Glass about their approach to making a social photo service that isn’t exha...

Episode 148: Creativity with S J Watson

18 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

“With writing I’m trying to use a story to create images, and with photography I’m trying to use images to create a story.” That’s S J Watso...

Episode 147: Is Photo Editing Too Difficult?

04 Aug 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Is photo editing too difficult? Layers and sliders and specialized apps and lots of options are available to us for processing our digital photos. How...

Episode 146: Tea and Coffee

21 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

When we record PhotoActive, Kirk is at the end of his day in the U.K. and Jeff has just begun in Seattle, which means we both start off with steaming ...

Episode 145: Kirk Simplifies with One Camera

07 Jul 2023

Contributed by Lukas

He really went and did it. When Kirk decided to simplify his photography setup, he sold all of his Fujifilm cameras and lenses, put the Leica Q2 Monoc...

Episode 144: Wrangling Libraries with Matthieu Kopp

23 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

If you’re like Jeff and Kirk, you probably have multiple photo libraries spread across your disks. Whether it’s because you use several editing ap...

Episode 143: Mike Shaw Wants You to Enjoy the Stars

09 Jun 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The weather is warming up, the skies are clearing, and we point our eyes and cameras to the sky. But capturing the night sky well requires more than j...

Episode 142: Photomator

26 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

The folks behind Pixelmator Pro have just released Photomator for Mac, iPhone, and iPad, and it’s won us over. Designed as a straightforward photo e...

Episode 141: You Say You Want a Resolution

12 May 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Camera resolution is easy, right? More pixels, more quality, more options, more better! But as soon as you start digging into it, from the iPhone 14 P...

Episode 140: Denoise and Healing Tools

29 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Adobe added a new AI-assisted denoise feature to Lightroom and a Remove tool in the public beta of Photoshop, both of which are impressive. But how ma...

Episode 139: The Rant Episode

14 Apr 2023

Contributed by Lukas

It’s time to rant. Are photographers spending too much energy in front of the computer instead of behind the camera? Does posting a photo to a publi...

Episode 138: DPReview and AI Photography

31 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

We had an entirely different topic planned for this episode and then learned just before recording that the website DPReview is being shut down after ...

Episode 137: Zoom Lenses with Chris Niccolls

17 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Chris Niccolls joins us this episode to talk about zoom lenses! Chris gets to shoot using most new cameras and lenses for DPReview TV, so we wanted to...

Episode 136: Photo Preconceptions

04 Mar 2023

Contributed by Lukas

Do you use a particular lens or photographic technique because someone said that was the only way to do it? In this episode, we break down some common...

Episode 135: Metadata

17 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

“I never metadata I didn’t like.” Do we need to spend hours entering metadata for our images? Or do we even care about metadata? We look at why ...

Episode 134: Mike Hipple Lived Through That

03 Feb 2023

Contributed by Lukas

We’re excited to welcome photographer Mike Hipple to talk about his latest book “Lived Through That: 90s Musicians Today.” What started as an ar...

Episode 133: New Year, New Goals

20 Jan 2023

Contributed by Lukas

What will your photography look like in the new year? Although Kirk and Jeff are wary of making any New Year’s resolutions, they each came up with p...

Episode 132: The Best Focal Length

23 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Perhaps you’ve heard that there’s an ideal focal length that is the closest approximation to the human eye. Or perhaps you’re a purist who can’...

Episode 131: Buying a New Camera

09 Dec 2022

Contributed by Lukas

October and November bring a deluge of new camera announcements, which gets our minds to thinking, “Do we need new cameras?” But buying a camera t...

Episode 130: Apple Photos Little-Known Features

25 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, we’re focusing our attention on features in the Photos apps for Mac and iOS/iPadOS. Did you know you can select text in images, sel...

Episode 129: Visualizing the Edit

11 Nov 2022

Contributed by Lukas

When you look through the viewfinder of your camera, what do you see? Just the scene in front of the lens, or the version you know is possible when yo...

Episode 128: New iPads and Lightroom Updates

28 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple announced new iPad and iPad Pro models aimed at two very different audiences, but how do they look for photographers? Also new are updates to Ad...

Episode 127: Hands-On with the iPhone 14 Pro Cameras

14 Oct 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple says every new iPhone is the Best Ever iPhone, but when it comes to the cameras in the iPhone 14 Pro, could that be more than just hyperbole? Fi...

Episode 126: Portfolio Building with William Neill

30 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Putting together a photo portfolio doesn’t need to be a daunting task. William Neill returns to PhotoActive to talk about his new book, The Photogra...

Episode 125: Gunning the Photonic Engine with the iPhone 14 Cameras

16 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Here we go again: Apple has released the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Pro, with more camera enhancements including a new 48 megapixel sensor on the Pro. Wh...

Episode 124: Food Photography with Lauren Caris Short

02 Sep 2022

Contributed by Lukas

How do you make mouth-watering photos of food? This week we’re joined by Lauren Caris Short, author of the beautiful new book The Complete Guide to ...

Episode 123: Learn Your Camera

19 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It’s easy to forget that your camera is more than just a box that records light. It’s a sophisticated computer with a huge amount of control over ...

Episode 122: The Photographer's Radar

05 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In our last episode, Kirk asked a question that stumped Jeff: While on vacation, did Jeff ever think about not taking a camera with him for a day? Bei...

Episode 121: Jeff's European Photo Adventure

22 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Jeff just returned from two weeks in France and Italy with almost 3000 photos, even though his was a family vacation and not a “photo trip,” per s...

Episode 120: The Cameras of the Future

24 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What do the cameras of the future look like? The ones we use now are vastly different from cameras just a decade or two ago, so it’s reasonable to a...

Episode 119: WWDC and New Apple OSes

10 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple's Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) wrapped up last week, and with it a lot of news about hardware like the M2-powered MacBook Air and what'...

Episode 118: Scott Kelby's Travel Tips

27 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Scott Kelby joins us this week to talk about travel photography, using the years of experience he’s gained and now collected into his new book The T...

Episode 117: John Cornicello on Lens Distortion

13 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In episode 110, Kirk and Jeff talked about dealing with distortion when you’re editing your photos. Now we’re happy to welcome portrait photograph...

Episode 116: iPad Photo Editing

29 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Is an iPad good for photo editing? It can be great for slimming your amount of gear on a trip, but what tradeoffs are involved? In this episode, Jeff ...

Episode 115: iPhone Camera Tips & Tricks

15 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Millions of people take billions of photos using the built-in Camera app on their iPhones, so we wanted to do an episode all about the clever and some...

Episode 114: Bryan Jones on Why Color Doesn't Exist

01 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

An offhand remark from our guest Bryan Jones when he was a guest on a previous episode stuck with us: “You know color doesn’t actually exist, righ...

Episode 113: Do Photographers Need the Mac Studio?

18 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple announced the Mac Studio, a brand new M1-based desktop Mac that smokes the performance of even the Mac Pro. But is it a good machine for photogr...

Episode 112: Dan Bracaglia on Rediscovering Joy

04 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Dan Bracaglia joins us again to talk about that perennial problem: rekindling the joy of photography. Especially in winter, it’s easy to remain unin...

Episode 111: The Glass App(roach) to Photography

18 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Tom Watson and Stefan Borsje created the Glass app as a way to get back to the experience of enjoying photography, without the endless pursuit of enga...

Episode 110: Dealing with Distortion

04 Feb 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What can you do when shooting with a wide lens introduces unwanted optical distortion in your photos? In this episode, Kirk and Jeff look at ways to c...

Episode 109: Joe McNally Is The Real Deal

21 Jan 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Joe McNally, who humbly refers to himself as a “working photographer,” has shot everything from high-concept editorial to the Olympic games, and e...