8 things we just learned about the iPhone 8

For its 10-year anniversary, Apple is widely expected to redesign the iPhone yet again -- and another leak may have just spoiled some of the phone's new features.

Last week, the company seems to have mistakenly pushed out a firmware update for the new HomePod smart speaker, a device that won't even be available until December. And when iOS developers Steve Troughton-Smith and Guilherme Rambo dug through that code, they found buried treasure.

That said, it appears that we know a lot more about the next iPhone now than we did just a week ago. Here are our eight big takeaways.

1. The bezels appear to be going away.
2. It seems to have facial recognition, aka 'Pearl ID'.
3. There's apparently no home button...
4. The fate of the Touch ID fingerprint sensor is unclear, too
5. Your status bar may never be the same
6. Apple's augmented reality seems to get a boost
7. There's a tiny shred of evidence for wireless charging
8. The new iPhone probably won't be alone

Extracted from: https://www.cnet.com/news/iphone-8-rumors-leaks-8-things/

The Laws of Photography

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The Laws of Photography

Laws regarding public photography have always been a gray area. In the United States, photographs that are taken for editorial use in a public place generally enjoy Constitutional protection under the right of free speech. There are exceptions, however. Here are just a few of the gray areas:

• Police crime scenes, disasters, fires or riots are considered secured emergency areas. Photography isn’t legal in these situations without permission.
• Even editorial photographs can come under scrutiny when a caption is added. If photo captions imply something false or libelous about the person in the photo, then they aren't legally protected free speech.
• Photos of a person in a public place can’t be used to promote any goods or services without permission.

The controversy surrounding anti-paparazzi legislation comes down to the question of where to draw the line between legitimate news gathering and invasions of privacy. If laws are left as they are, a celebrity's privacy -- and, in some cases, his or her life -- may continue to be endangered by the ruthlessness of some photographers [source: LaPorte]. On the other hand, if the laws become too restrictive, then the freedom of the press could be jeopardized, and for that reason, a judicial tension remains between the two.

With the cultural appetite for celebrity voyeurism, it’s questionable whether the public is even concerned about anti-paparazzi legislation. As long as images of the rich and famous committing foibles both minor and monstrous continue to arrest our attention -- and sway our online traffic and magazine purchases -- the paparazzi mobs will continue to swarm and snap. After all, they’re only giving us what we want: proof that celebrities are imperfect, just like us..

Are Photographers & Paparazzi The Same?

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Are Photographers & Paparazzi The Same?

Submitted by Andrea Feczko on Sat, 02/10/2007 - 5:47pm.

After reading this NY Times article profiling Johnny Nunez, a well respected hip-hop photographer, my perception shifted on the label paparazzi.
Rarely is a photographer deemed such when dealing with celebrity clients, instead they are negatively coined as a vicious paparazzo. But some paparazzi, like Mr.Nunez, are in fact well respected and loved. Sure he is aggressive and pushy at times, but don't all photographers- and journalists- act the same way? Why aren't journalists and hard news photographers labeled as paparazzi?
Maybe Mr. Nunez is given a good review because it's fashion week where contrary to popular belief, the attendees are very open and excited by the press. It's a place where celebrities and press gain mutual benefits from one another.
I understand that press events and daily celebrity life are two very different worlds, but why can't we draw the line on the photographers' labels as well? In a place like fashion week where image is everything, great pictures sell more than just tabloids. Photography is first and foremost an art and I believe photographers should be given credit for their talent and labeled accordingly.
Maybe if the media and public collectively expected excellence from photographers, rather than invasion from paparazzi, then we could all benefit from increased quality and happy celebrities.

Jonas Pelli @ Sat, 02/10/2007 - 7:13pm

"Photography is first and foremost an art and I believe photographers should be given credit for their talent and labeled accordingly."
I totally agree. I think the difference between photographers and paparazzi lies in the difference between intent of the shooter and the desire of the subject to be shot. Paparazzi pry, probe, and violate privacy of subjects who don't want their picture taken. Photographers, on the other hand, have an authentic desire to create something mutually positive for both themselves and their subject. Fashion week is a good example; there's no exploitation because both sides are benefiting, and couldn't do so without each other.

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Source: https://journalism.nyu.edu/publishing/archives/wewantmedia/node/245
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12 Things I Wish I Knew Before Becoming a Paparazzo

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12 Things I Wish I Knew Before Becoming a Paparazzo

It's not glamorous.

1. You need to be really skilled at more than just photography. Paparazzi shots are a really technical style of photography, and I guess I can compare it to war photography or animal photography. You have to have a crazy amount of street smarts, because you're basically a spy. You need to be quiet and behind the scenes. You have to understand the way people think, how they work, which way they're going to go. You think ahead of the people that you're following or other paparazzi in order to get the celebrity as they reach their destination.

2. If you're going to work freelance (as opposed to being fully staffed with an agency), it will be hard to make a living. I was papping from 2006 to 2009 and I actually made a lot of money doing it. But there's not very much money in paparazzi right now anymore. With the rise of Instagram, celebrities have the power to take the shots themselves, sometimes making paparazzi shots worthless. If you're really good, you might be lucky and make $75,000, but you probably have $20,000 or $30,000 of expenses a year on top of that. In addition, you probably can spend $30,000 in equipment. You spend a lot on gas. You spend money on tips [people who call you to tip you off to where a celebrity is are oftentimes rewarded with money as a gesture of goodwill]. Your office is Beverly Hills, West Hollywood, and Santa Monica, which are awesome but expensive places to hang out because you're spending a lot of money on food and all that kind of stuff. You need a really reliable, good car, which is another $30,000.

3. Being freelance offers a lot of flexibility and freedom, but it can get pretty lonely. One of the main reasons to be tied with in agency is for camaraderie and brainstorming with people about who to work and what to do. Otherwise, you can go for days completely on your own. But there are lots of benefits to being a freelance photographer. When you are really well-established, you can do what you want. I took one photo of Molly Ringwald one time that was really unflattering that I didn't send in. I love Molly Ringwald, I grew up with Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club, and so I did not want the tabloids making fun of her based on my photograph. I really liked the autonomy of the [freelance] business. I got paid based on how I performed, and if I wanted to take two months off and go to Thailand, I could and I did! If I wanted to not work Sundays or after 5 o'clock, I could do that too.

4. You'll be in a new place nearly every day. You get up at 9 a.m. and grab a coffee, and at the same time, you're looking for celebrities at the coffee shop. From there, you can do one of two things. You can either doorstep, which is when you are assigned or you assign yourself to a particular celebrity, and you go sit outside their house and hope they leave. You could doorstep a gym or a restaurant or an area of town or a city block that celebrities go to a lot. Or you can troll and just drive around looking for celebs. You start to know and memorize their cars. To be honest, I can recognize a celebrity from a long way away just based on the way they walk and the way they wear their hair. You become really good at people-spotting.

5. You can make great money off a single photo, but you can't expect to make a living taking great photos every so often. There were probably three or four photos I've probably made anywhere from $6,000 to $9,000 each. It's hard to figure out exactly how much you make off a single picture because money comes in really slowly — you make money off residuals over one or two years from a bunch of different sources. I think Paris Hilton holding the Bible right before she went to jail was one of my big shots. I only probably made about $8,000 on that, which, based on the fact that it was all over the world, was not very much money. It's all about working every day. If you decide, "Oh, I can do this job," and bank on three times a month getting big photos, you're not going make it. You have to go out five days a week like a normal job and then you'll end up developing a good library and having shots sell over time.


6. Papping is not for people who aren't competitive or thick-skinned. The absolute hardest thing about the job was the other paparazzi. It's a very competitive business. Until you have established yourself as one of the top dogs and until you've gained the respect of others, then the guys are going to try and get you out of the business. The day that it all changed was when I shot Jennifer Aniston at the beach about nine months in. Ironically, I didn't make any money on that shot because other photographers got the same one, but it was just so valuable to me career-wise and professionally because Jennifer Aniston was such a big star and [usually] so hard to get in photographs, [and] everything changed for me.  I got total respect in the business, and everyone started leaving me alone and even looking up to me.

7. There are almost no women in this industry, and it's really hard to work in it as one. There are only about five female paparazzi at any given time in L.A. I didn't know if the hate would ever stop and I was getting so beat up as a female. It was just so oppressive. The guys were so nasty, so mean. I write in my book that I have been spit on, pushed down, run off the road, and "told on" for things like getting in a shot or poor driving, but this abuse is always done silently. I was never spoken to directly.

8. The relationships between celebrities and paparazzi varies from person-to-person, but generally, the celebs want to work with you. The relationship between paparazzi and celebrities is very symbiotic. A lot of the people that you're working on on a day-to-day basis want to be in magazines and are not nasty with you. I remember one of my colleagues when I was first getting started said to me, "If you can make them smile, you're golden." Most people look at the covers of some of the seedier tabloids and they see really negative stories that make it look like the tabloids are all about trashing the celebrities. But 90 percent of what we photograph, and 90 percent of what the public wants and buys are happy celebrities looking stylish with their head up, smiling. Those pictures are what the tabloids want to buy, and those require us as paparazzi to be non-antagonistic with the celebrities and to actually even develop friendships with them. As much bad press paparazzi get, I have to say, in my almost three years of doing it, I never saw a paparazzi taunt a celebrity to try and get a photo. I'm sure it's probably happened, but I've seen thousands of shoots and I've never seen that.

9. Certain celebrities are much more paparazzi-savvy than others. When I was working, Paris Hilton was the absolute best and smartest. She's a brilliant media goddess who doesn't go anywhere without completely planning the shots the paparazzi will take. Cameron Diaz is another one who I love. She's just brilliant. She uses the paparazzi when she wants to and when she needs it: When she and Justin Timberlake broke up, she wanted to get photographed all the time looking super hot and totally used us. We were all here for the use! We were like, "All right, you're making us money. We'll help you, you help us."

10. A celebrity breakdown is difficult for a pap too. To be honest, when Britney was breaking down, we were her only friends there for, like, a year. She dated a paparazzo! Even though it was kind of sick that she got all her affirmation from us, she did and we were really, really rooting for Britney during that period of time. I wasn't working on her every day, but there was a group of guys who worked on her every day and they became very close with and very protective of her. Not only because they were making money but you start to care about people as human beings when you're with them all the time.

11. Being starstruck gets old pretty quickly. Toward the end, it was so hard to become starstruck, so I would need to see someone like Brad Pitt in order to have a good day. I was so bored of Miley Cyrus and Zac Efron and Paris Hilton and all these people that are very famous but would so not excite me. Having connected with so many celebrities, it would have to be someone really big.

12. It's easy to burn out. If you wanted to do something wild and exciting just for fun for a few years, you could do it. I knew another girl who was in it for that reason. She was awesome, we were really good friends, but she only lasted less than a year. She was just in it because she loved celebrities and thought it was super fun, but when things got hard and she realized how hard it was to really make money, and how trained and on-the-ball you needed to be to make money, she got out of it. I stayed in the business longer than most people, but toward the end, I barely worked eight hours a day because I was pregnant and I was also so over it. After that, I retired my camera except for baby pictures (and the occasional celeb who crosses my path).

Jennifer Buhl was a top-selling female pap in L.A. from 2006 to 2009 and author of the book Shooting Stars: My Unexpected Life Photographing Hollywood's Most Famous. She now lives in Denver, Colorado, and runs Happy Hour Headshot..

Source: http://www.cosmopolitan.com/career/a45449/things-i-wish-i-knew-before-becoming-paparazzi/

What is the difference between paparazzi and paparazzo?

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A variety of sources define paparazzo as a noun referring to a freelance photographer who specializes in images of famous people for sale to magazines and newspapers while often invading their privacy to obtain such photographs or video. The word “paparazzi” is the plural of “paparazzo.”

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Andy Warhol ‘Soup Can’ Prints Are Stolen From a Missouri Museum

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The F.B.I. is offering a $25,000 reward for the recovery of seven screen prints of Andy Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup cans after they were snatched from an art museum in Springfield, Mo.

The prints of the cans, which are among the artist’s most recognizable works, had been part of the Springfield Art Museum’s collection since 1985, and were currently on display in a special exhibit of British and American pop art. The prints, not to be confused with Mr. Warhol’s original set of 32 soup can paintings, were from a later series called Campbell’s Soup 1. They were made in 1968, about six years after Mr. Warhol’s paintings created a cultural sensation (and divided the art world). The F.B.I. estimates that the total value of the prints, which came in a set of 10, to be about $500,000.

But the value could be a lot less now, because the thieves made off with only seven of the 10 prints: the beef, vegetable, tomato, onion, green pea, chicken noodle and black bean cans.

The Warhol prints were a point of local pride in Springfield, according to Lisa Cox, a spokeswoman with the Springfield Police Department. “They were one of those kinds of ‘claim to fame’ types of pieces,” Ms. Cox said.

The soup can prints were more than three feet tall and two feet wide. They were displayed on a wall in white wooden frames. Because they are delicate, they had been displayed only a handful of times over the years..

The prints are believed to have been snatched after the museum was closed and the doors were locked around 5 p.m. Wednesday, Ms. Cox said.

The museum does not have a security staff after hours, and when the doors were opened the next morning around 8:45 a.m., employees noticed that the prints were missing. The Springfield Police Department and the F.B.I.’s Art Crime unit are working together to investigate the thefts.

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/13/arts/warhols-soup-cans-stolen-prints-springfield-missouri.html

The fascinating story behind Andy Warhol's soup cans

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Reflecting on his career, Warhol claimed that the Campbell’s Soup Can was his favourite work and that, "I should have just done the Campbell’s Soups and kept on doing them ... because everybody only does one painting anyway." Certainly, it is the signature image of the artist’s career and a key transitional work from his hand-painted to photo-transferred paintings. Created during the year that Pop Art emerged as the major new artistic movement, two of his soup can paintings were included in the landmark Sidney Janis Gallery exhibition, ‘The New Realists’.

In the spring of 1962, Warhol had been working on his new renditions of ads and comic strips when he saw Roy Lichtenstein’s comic-strip paintings at Leo Castelli Gallery. Soliciting suggestions for subjects to paint, he asked a friend, who suggested he choose something that everybody recognised like Campbell’s Soup. In a flash of inspiration he bought cans from the store and began to trace projections onto canvas, tightly painting within the outlines to resemble the appearance of the original offset lithograph labels. Instead of the dripping paint in his previous ads and comics, here Warhol sought the precision of mechanical reproduction. At this time he received a return studio visit from Irving Blum of Ferus Gallery, Los Angeles, who was expecting to see comic-strip paintings and was surprised by the new soup cans, immediately offering the artist a show that summer. Expanding his subject, he decided to paint one of each of the thirty-two varieties of Campbell’s soups. Blum exhibited the cans on shelves running the length of his gallery.

The exhibition caused a mild sensation in Los Angeles. The more daring members of the youthful art and film community were intrigued by their novelty. Most people, however, treated them with indifference or outright disdain. A nearby art dealer parodied the show by displaying a stack of soup cans, advertising that you could get them cheaper in his gallery. Blum had sold five of the paintings before he recognised that the group functioned best as a single work of art. He bought back the works already purchased, including one from Dennis Hopper, then offered to buy the set from Warhol in instalments for the modest sum of $3,000.

With his Campbell’s Soup Cans installation at Ferus Gallery, the artist realised the possibility of creating works in series, and the visual effect of serial imagery. He continued making variations on his Soup Cans, stencilling multiple cans within a single canvas and so amplifying the effect of products stacked in a grocery store, an idea that he would later develop in the box sculptures. He also realised that the serial repetition of an image drained it of its meaning, an interesting phenomenon most poignantly presented in his Disasters, in which the constant exposure to their graphic displays of violence numbs the senses. And, perhaps the most significant outcome of this series was the artist’s push towards printing to achieve the mechanical appearance that he sought in his paintings.

Source: http://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/art/articles/2013/february/22/the-fascinating-story-behind-andy-warhols-soup-cans/
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