Innholdsfortegnelse for 12/16/25 i Amateur Photographer

All these powerful compact cameras for stills photography doesn’t mean that makers somehow forgot about video, however. Indeed, we saw several video-first cinema cameras this year, notably the Nikon ZR, Sony FX2 and Canon EOS C50. The Nikon ZR is particularly interesting, being the fruit of the firm’s acquisition of cine camera maker, RED. The ZR uses the same 24MP partially-stacked CMOS sensor as the Z6III. This supports 6K 60p raw using the full sensor width, and 4K 120p raw with a 1.5x (DX) crop. Full HD recording is also available at 240fps. The body is relatively compact, though, as is the price – £2,199 body only. While some corners had to be cut to keep the bulk and price down, you can see why editor Nigel Atherton described the…

Sebastião Salgado On 23 May, the legendary documentary photographer Sebastião Salgado died at the age of 81 from leukaemia and complications from a bout of malaria he contracted in Indonesia in 2010. Internationally celebrated for his large-scale and long-term projects highlighting the plight of threatened cultures, environments and people, Salgado approached his subjects with a deep humanity that was reflected in images that conveyed a powerful connection with the viewer. Indeed, his images have a depth, resonance and archetypical, almost biblical quality that no other photographer has matched. Here’s a recap of Salgado’s stellar career. A global citizen Sebastião Ribeiro Salgado was born on 8 February 1944 to cattle rancher parents in a small town in the eastern part of Brazil. After studying economics in Brazil and Paris, and moving…

Jay Davies, Director of Photography, News EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) at Getty Images This picture shows U.S. President Donald Trump standing behind the Resolute Desk as others help a man who fainted during an event in the Oval Office on 6 November. The photo, by Andrew Harnik, exemplifies the quick thinking required when a highly controlled event goes off the rails. In footage of the incident, you can see how quickly it all unfolds and how fleeting the opportunity was for Harnik and his fellow photographers to make this picture. Although Trump remains mostly stationary for several seconds, White House staff and Secret Service try to swiftly usher press from the room, while others walk through the frame, spoiling countless pictures in the process. Through quick reflexes and…

At the end of every year, we like to look back at the cameras and lenses that have been launched and tease out trends. As with the past few years, full-frame mirrorless cameras dominated the market in 2025. But other formats are still going strong, with notable releases from Hasselblad, Fujifilm and OM System. And while there’s been an increase in video-first models, we’ve also seen a re-emergence of photography-focused compacts. In the full-frame sphere, the Canon EOS R6 Mark III and Sony Alpha A7 V both arrived late in the year as all-rounders for serious enthusiasts. For those on a tighter budget, the Nikon Z5II offers an unprecedented feature set at a very attractive price. Panasonic gave us not just one, but three high-end S1-series models with different feature…

OnePlus 13 I’ve reviewed a few phones this year from the likes of OnePlus, Honor, and Oppo, and still my favourite to use has been the OnePlus 13 (for now at least, because as I am writing this, I’m reviewing the Oppo Find X9 Pro!). I’ve been using the OnePlus 13 as my main phone since it made waves in January. I have been a OnePlus user for a while now; my previous phone was the original OnePlus Nord. Described as ‘the ultimate flagship powerhouse’, everything and the kitchen sink were put into this phone in hopes of toppling Apple, Samsung and Google off their podiums. The OnePlus 13 continues the firm’s streak of creating high-quality and well-performing models, and the 13 has even more to offer in terms of…

OMSystem OM-3 Paris in January isn’t for the faint-fingered. The light was flat, air icy-cold and the crowds relentless. The new OM System OM-3 feels as though it was built for challenges. I’d usually spend half a day wrestling a new camera out of its box and into submission; this one was up and running within minutes. Manual mode, ISO 400, and off I went, an Englishman abroad with a beret-level charm: ‘Je m’appelle Pierre Dench.’ The OM-3 inherits much from the OM-1 Mark II – a 20.4-megapixel stacked BSI sensor, 4K 60p video, and compatibility with the Micro Four Thirds lenses we’ve come to know and occasionally drop. It’s made for documentary and street-style camera work, which is perfect because the streets of Paris don’t pose twice. What struck…

It’s also been a busy year for smartphone makers, particularly in the hyper-competitive Android market. Beyond AI features, slimmer dimensions and beefed-up battery life, some cool technology came to the fore, exemplified by the Oppo Find X9 Pro. As well as being able to capture still photos at 50MP by default on all three rear cameras, a new Hasselblad Hi Res mode enables you to shoot 200MP still images. While this feature might seem overkill for a comparatively small phone sensor, it gives lots of cropping flexibility. Oppo also rolled out a Hasselbladbranded teleconverter, which gives a far-reaching telephoto focal length of 230mm. At €500, it’s a niche purchase but we are likely to see more add-on lenses from phone makers. The Xiaomi 15 Ultra continued to up the ante…

Martin Parr. Rarely does a day pass in my professional life when he isn’t mentioned by, or to me. One of the world’s greatest photographers and a behemoth of photographic history. News of his death at 73 has gone off like a flashbulb to the heart. Parr’s lens shaped how the British see ourselves: sunburnt, snacking, stubbornly human and often hilarious without quite intending to be. His work was a mirror we didn’t always want but needed. His influence was everywhere. It’s impossible to photograph in Britain, in colour, without seeing Parr parts everywhere in the everyday. His photography fuels debates from pub corners, and college darkrooms to online forums. Aged 18 I discovered his book The Last Resort, his glorious, lurid, unapologetic dive into New Brighton. It was a…

Geoff Harris, Deputy Editor Chappell Roan by Josh Druding For me, gig photography has been like learning to play the guitar: my results are okay, but I’m never going to hit the big league. Shooting big gigs is particularly challenging, as you have to work fast, deal with fast-moving subjects and ever-changing lights, and be prepared to elbow other photographers out of the way to get the money shot. So, I’ve got a lot of respect for photographers who capture great gig shots, and Josh Druding’s image of Chappell Roan ticks all the boxes. I love the classic, subject-off-centre composition and dynamism of this very engaging picture, taken at the Lollapalooza festival in Chicago. The details of Roan’s fabulous outfit are beautifully captured, while the audience’s outstretched hands and Chicago…

Samsung Galaxy Z Fold7 For many years I just didn’t really get the appeal of folding phones. They were clunky and awkwardly designed (Google Pixel Fold – I’m looking at you), with fragile screens, and ended up larger than normal phones. In addition to that, the cameras were worse than regular phones. This all changed this year, for me anyway, with the Fold7, which feels smaller than a flagship phone when folded, and the screen is simply a pleasure to look at. And more importantly, the camera system on the phone has been massively upgraded compared to the Fold 6. A 200MP main camera that’s the same as the flagship S25 Ultra, a 3x telephoto camera that’s the same as the S25/Plus, and an ultra-wideangle camera with autofocus, so it…

Fujifilm X-E5 When I took the Fujifilm X100VI to South Africa last year and wrote about my experiences in AP, I concluded that it was a beautiful camera for travels but I would struggle to go on any trip with just a single fixed-focal-length lens. If only there was an interchangeable-lens version! Well lo and behold the X-E5 is exactly that, and it’s a beauty. Okay it isn’t exactly the same: it lacks weatherproofing and the 23mm pancake lens is f/2.8 instead of f/2, but otherwise you’d struggle to tell them apart. I took the X-E5 to Cuba, along with the X-T50 and X-T30 III to compare them (feature and video coming soon) and although all are very similar in operation and features, the X-E5 just begs to be picked…

Sigma I-series prime lenses Early this year we saw the launch of the unique Sigma BF full-frame mirrorless camera, with a body sculpted from a single block of aluminium and a strikingly minimalist design. Reviewing it gave me an excuse to try out Sigma’s I-series primes, which match the camera very nicely. And not just use them individually, in the way I normally review lenses, but by using several together as a set. And you know what? They really are very lovely indeed. These lenses stand slightly apart from Sigma’s other offerings, with aluminium barrels and tactile aperture rings. They even come with magnetic front caps and beautifully sculpted (there’s no other word for it) metal hoods. As part of the ‘Contemporary’ range, they’re more affordable than the firm’s top-end…

As can be seen in Andy Westlake’s extensive camera round-up (starting on page 71), 2025 has seen the release of several high-end compacts designed specifically for photography, rather than video or content creators. It’s another reminder that the formerly moribund compact camera sector is now in rude health! One of the most interesting releases was the Fujifilm GFX100RF, which combines the company’s strengths in high-end compacts – notably the wildly popular X100VI – with medium-format sensors from its GFX system. So, the GFX100RF comes with a 102MP CMOS sensor and a fixed 28mm equivalent f/4 lens. Despite all this imaging power, the camera is relatively compact, at 133.5 x 90.4 x 76.5mm and weighing 735g. As the world’s first fixed-lens medium-format compact, the GFX100RF is not cheap – £4,699 –…

Blacksmith Greg Abel works in near-total darkness, the colour of hot metal determining his next move. Dust settles on his clothes, skin and hair, turning everything grey. At the heart of the room is a forge housing a coal fire that Greg expertly tends. The walls around him are lined with tools for grasping, twisting and hammering metal. He is the master of his domain, and his cave-like workplace is both a photographer’s paradise and a photographer’s worst nightmare. Award-winning journalist and photographer Suzy Bennett first encountered Greg while looking to buy a curtain rail nearly 20 years ago. ‘I’d just moved to Devon from London and the cottage I live in has very wobbly walls,’ she smiles. Someone from the pub suggested that Suzy contact the local blacksmith, so…

Leading Android smartphone maker Honor has announced the new Magic8 Lite handset – it breaks new barriers with a long-lasting 7500mAh silicon-carbon battery, along with an AI 108MP Ultra-sensing Camera for capturing images with fine detail. Before exploring the powerful camera features, let’s recap on the new phone’s unrivalled battery power. The large 7500mAh silicon-carbon cell allows for an incredible three days of battery life, with tests showing that it can cope with up to 52.5 hours of music streaming, 23.8 hours of online video playback, 16.8 hours of gaming and 12.3 hours of video chat on one single charge. So that is more than enough power to cope with photography and video recording. The Honor Magic8 Lite can handle the most demanding winter photo trips too, as the battery…

We’ve featured hundreds of photography books in AP this year in the review section and as features. Narrowing it down to just a few in our annual round-up is a tricky task but one I’ve relished. Books matter – they’re a great reminder that the publishing industry is in demand and there are many ways to get books into print. In this curation, I’ve tried to be diverse and yes, a bit indulgent. I’ve included books across a range of genres and tastes, as well as those which include contemporary photography, and others which feature historic or archival work. This year the trend among some publishers not to have a photograph on the cover continues. I was particularly struck by long form books, Regula Tschumi’s dazzling in-depth take on Ghanian…

Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 300mm F4 IS Pro lens Bird photography is something that’s always appealed to me, particularly as I’m lucky enough to live close to the Ham Wall RSPB bird reserve. The Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 300mm F4 IS Pro has been a great companion on my trips to Ham Wall this year, delivering an irresistible mix of superior optical performance, relatively low weight and affordability. Being a Micro Four Thirds lens, the 300mm F4 IS Pro gives you a 35mm equivalent focal length of 600mm when used on my Olympus OM-1. Yes, you can get longer and faster lenses, costing and weighing more, but 600mm equivalent feels like a real sweet spot. Shooting more-distant birds at a maximum wide aperture of f/4 means you don’t always get…

iPhone 17 Pro I’d be lying if I said that Apple makes the best smartphones for photographers. They don’t. It’s probably Xiaomi that does, maybe Samsung. But – and sorry, for all the iPhone haters – there’s just something so pleasingly ‘nice’ about iPhones. Don’t worry, I hate myself for saying it too. Almost certainly the best phone I used this year for photographers was the Xiaomi 15 Ultra, and that’s the one I’d tell you to buy if you were asking for me an objective opinion. It’s great, with a one-inch type sensor which really delivers the goods. But these pages aren’t for showing off what is the ‘best’, it’s for talking about our favourites. I’m choosing the iPhone 17 Pro because it’s the first review I did after…

Andy Westlake, Technical Editor City of Arts and Sciences, Valencia, June Fujifilm X-E5, XF 23mm F2.8 R WR, 1/350sec at f/8, ISO 250 In my job, I’m incredibly lucky to be able to test all the latest cameras, often before they are officially launched. I took this photo on a visit to Valencia with Fujifilm UK, to test the firm’s then-unannounced X-E5 camera. It was an afternoon spent wandering around the modern architectural complex known as The City of Arts and Sciences, which is something of a magnet for photographers. In locations like this the opportunities are endless, but it can also be difficult to come up with something beyond the obvious tourist shots. I framed the building known as L’Hemisfèric beneath the arcs of a concrete bridge, but needed…