There are days when In Rainbows feels like the best Radiohead album. It’s definitely in contention with 1995’s The Bends as the band’s most approachable, compulsively listenable release — the one you can just put on and enjoy without turning it into a full-blown immersive experience, the one that will meet you wherever you’re at and be beautiful in your presence.

I remember Radiohead being a band that I actively disliked. I remember thinking that their music was not for me. I remember foolishly deciding without much (nay, any) actual listening that Thom Yorke was full of 'it', and I wanted nothing to do with his band. I remember In Rainbows being dropped into the world unexpectedly, and me volunteering to pay $15 for music that I didn't think I wanted to hear because I liked the idea of their experiment.

I fell in love with this set of songs.

Radiohead are now a band whose faces are clearly chiseled onto my music 'Mount Rushmore'. When I began collecting vinyl a couple of years ago, I made sure that In Rainbows was at the top of my wishlists, and one of the first in my collection.

I still love this set of songs.

Like many photographers, I use Adobe's Lightroom to organize & edit my images. Earlier this week, Adobe announced some large changes to Lightroom going forward:

• A completely new version of Lightroom CC was released. This new application is more of a service, which will enable cloud-based access and editing of an entire library across all your devices.
• This new Lightroom is most definitely a version 1.0. It lacks a great many features from the previous versions of Lightroom. It does, however, come with what appears to be an improved and simplified interface, and much-needed performance improvements.
• The traditional desktop-based Lightroom software has been renamed Lightroom Classic CC. Adobe also released performance and tooling updates to this software, as well as made a commitment to continuing development (for now).

What does this all mean? For me and for now, I'm not quite sure, but this certainly could be the beginning of a major shift for many photographers, both professional and hobbyist.

As I've begun to try to put together some photo stories of my own, it's inspiring to see the great stuff being put out by people whose work I admire. Marius Masalar is one of those people. His recent Kenya travelogue has both incredible photos and engaging narrative. 👏🏻

For anyone of a certain age group — myself included — AIM was, quite simply, how we communicated. For many of us, its buddy lists, away messages, and screennames were firsts for us. Its time has long passed, but it had a great run.

Bye, AIM. You might not be missed, but neither will you be forgotten.

Nasim Mansurov, for Photography Life, writes:

I decided to write on a topic that nobody wants to talk about – how camera companies and everyone else involved in the camera industry are banking on people, AKA the consumers. I wrote this article primarily because of the sense of guilt I have had for years now and also because I do not want our readers to fall into the traps of consumerism.

Just remember, in 2017, technology — cameras, phones, or otherwise — is awesome, and has awesome potential to do the jobs we employ it for really well.

When shopping for the next piece of technology to add to your life, try to remember that. It might be a tool, it might be a toy, it might even be mission critical, but no matter what the jobs technology needs to do for you, there are probably multiple awesome solutions for you.

Companies will do their very best to overwhelm you with hype, in ways both transparent and opaque, but try not to fall for it. Instead of concentrating on the thing that is the "best" or "reviews" well, experience it yourself, make a choice based on what fits your life best, and don't worry about what the Internet says.

It's easier than ever to fall in love with the "new thing". Fall in love with the right thing.

Jim Wilson has been shooting photos for the New York Times since 1980:

When I started, everything was dependent on processed film, which meant having to bring film, a darkroom kit including enlarging and print making equipment, and a transmitter (very much like a souped up fax machine). We’d have to find or at least arrange for a telephone line and telephone access when we needed to send our images. I remember having a small portable typewriter that I’d use to write the captions that were pasted onto the photos before they were put on the drum transmitter and sent back to The Times. The phone lines were all analog, and each picture took around 10 minutes to send — if the line was interrupted for any reason, we’d have to start over. If we got out 10 images in a day, that was huge.

Today, many we carry connected cameras with us everywhere. Even large professional cameras tend to have direct networking capabilities.

Times sure have changed.

As a photographer that often uses post-processing to complete an image or create consistency across a set of images, I found this video to be a great little intro bending curves and tweaking colors.

Sean Tucker creates some fantastic images, and has a signature look to his photography that I'd asipre to have one day in my own work. Spending time in the Curves & Channels modules in Lightroom (or Darkroom on my iPhone) has always been hit or miss for me, and I've often leaned heavily on presets to bring consistency to my work. This recently published video has become a bit of an inspiration for me to attempt creating a more original aesthetic for my images:

www.seantucker.photography • instagram.com/seantuck

That said, I've often been asked what "presets" or "filters" I use on my images. Truthfully, I use quite a few different looks to create my images. I do, however, try to find a specific look to fit a mood or tone I'd like a set of images to have. This look often varies from set to set. I've used Lightroom presets from Rebecca Lily, VSCO, and Nate Photographic (just to name a few), as starting points for different image sets over the last few years. I've also spent quite a bit of time in Priime and VSCO over the last few years on my iPhone.

With this extra little bit of inspriation, I hope to spend a little less time with these other tools (these are all great tools though, and I'd recommend all of them), and a little more time with tools of my own making in the coming months.

I've met some incredible (and hopefully life-long) friends that have given countless hours of their time and energy as members of the LLS team here in the DC area.

It's an incredible cause and great organization. I'll be joining the LLS Alumni team this year in Mina's place. Please consider making a donation to help support the research of blood cancer treatments. Your contributions can and will help save lives.

The iPhone is the world's most popular camera. The fact that it’s attached to your smartphone means it’s nearly always with you. Austin Mann’s real world reviews each year really do a great job of showing just what’s possible. I look forward to getting a chance to employ the new portrait lighting (and new to me) portait modes in the near future.

Check out some of his previous reviews, even if the reviews themselves are now dated, the images & videos are still great:

• iPhone 7 Camera Review: Rwanda
• iPhone 6s Camera Review: Switzerland
• iPhone 6 Camera Review: Iceland