To celebrate the opening of our new East Coast Headquarters in Waltham, MA, we’re kicking off a giveaway on Twitter for a Cinevate Axis Jib. Visit our Twitter page to enter for a chance to win a new jib, plus other great prizes from our partners:

The Music Bed, GuraGear, SmugMug, Lexar, Adobe, creativeLIVE, Schneider Optics, onOne, Peak Design, Cinetics, Zacuto, Aviator Camera Gear, Think Tank Photo, B&H, 500px, Timescapes, Photojojo and more.

HOW TO ENTER (more…)

Welcome to Cool Stuff, a weekly feature where we post our favorite links from the past week, including our favorite articles and how-tos, videos, images and more.

• Starting off with a little humor: the folks at DigitalRev have posted a trailer of a video they shot with Chase Jarvis. Chase, who has worked with bleeding-edge gear from RED, Nikon and others, now takes on… drumroll, please… a LEGO camera.
• Don’t know if you’ve heard, but it’s Christmas time! Our friends at DPS have come up with a list of gifts under $20 for photographers.
• Speaking of Christmas (and Chase Jarvis), the folks at creativeLIVE have a bunch of specials over at their site. Personally, I’ve bought so many videos there, I keep getting the “You already own this, dummy!” notice on a bunch of the specials pages. Still, as photographic education goes, it doesn’t get much better than creativeLIVE, so go take advantage of these deals!
• Travellers pay heed. PetaPixel has a great piece on how best to pack your camera gear if you HAVE to check it.
• Look, we encourage people to take up photography every day here at BorrowLenses.com. But even we did a double take on this post from Consumerist, which suggested that people take up photography as a way to earn a few extra bucks this holiday season. Thankfully, Popular Photography stepped up to the plate to explain why this may not be a great idea.
• Printing service Zazzle has a new tool that lets you visualize what your artwork would look like on your walls. If you ever wanted to check out what that image of your cat looks like in your living room, blow up to 20“ x 30”, now you can.
• What happens in the club, stays in the club – at least as far as flash photography goes. Beer company Cerveza Norte has developed a flash-blocking beer cooler. Take that, paparazzi!
• Look out! He’s on fire! He’s ablaze! He’s… lit with glow-sticks? Light painter Dennis Calvert presents this time lapse video of the making of one of his amazing images.

That’s it for this week’s cool stuff. If you have something you think should be included, let us know! Email us at [email protected].

Top 5 Learning Resources for Photographers

Here’s what we’ve come to realize after more than four years in the business: our customers don’t fit any one particular mold. We have rank amateurs, passionate about photography and picking up a DSLR for the first time. We have photographers about to go into business for themselves after years of shooting for pleasure. We also have high-end customers for whom a ten-camera shoot is just another Tuesday.

Whether you’re that rank amateur or that budding professional or that seasoned veteran of the industry, the one thing you can never stop doing is learning. Constant education is a requirement in this industry and those who don’t evolve are doomed to extinction. With that in mind, we put together a small list of educational resources that we go to constantly, be it for a quick lookup on a specific technique, or for inspiration when we’re in a rut. There’s a little something here for everyone regardless of your skill level. (more…)