Tom May

Tom May

Tom May is a freelance writer and editor specializing in art, photography, design and travel. He has been editor of Professional Photography magazine, associate editor at Creative Bloq, and deputy editor at net magazine. He has also worked for a wide range of mainstream titles including The Sun, Radio Times, NME, T3, Heat, Company and Bella.

Latest articles by Tom May

Gentoo Penguin striding along beach on New Island, Falklands
An English photographer bought a ravaged, wind-lashed Falklands island in 1972 to give it a second chance. Now, as Argentina and Britain argue over the archipelago once again, millions of seabirds continue to benefit from his remarkable vision

By Tom May Published

Feature New Island's remarkable recovery offers a counterpoint to the saber-rattling around it

Feature
A century of National Geographic's best US photography, gathered together in one beautiful volume, makes me want to go out and shoot on film again

By Tom May Published

news Timed for the USA's 250th birthday, TASCHEN's new 700-image retrospective is an intoxicating read

news
Selection of the best graphics cards for video editing photographed on a green background
The best graphics cards for video editing in 2026

By Ben Andrews Last updated

Updated Speed up your workflow with one of the best graphics cards for video editing.

Updated
The cover image for Cowboy Kate & Other Stories (1964), a close-up portrait of a woman in a black hat with tousled blonde hair falling across one eye.
Strange but true: one of the photographers who defined the look of London's Swinging Sixties was actually working 5,000 miles away

By Tom May Published

Born and raised in South Africa, Sam Haskins turned ordinary young women into icons, creating some of the era's most influential images from a Johannesburg studio

Fashion Photography
Magnum Photos' British photographer Ian Berry poses in front of his exibition "Ghana's Disposable Children" during the 19th International Festival of Photojournalism/Visa pour l'Image, 06 September 2007 in Perpignan.
RIP Ian Berry, the Magnum photojournalist who shot the only photos of the Sharpeville massacre, and who spent more than seven decades working hard, being humble, and insisting the job was never about the gear

By Tom May Published

Obituary The English photographer has died aged 92, leaving behind an astonishing legacy of work

Obituary
August Sander: Bohemians (Willy Bongard and Gottfried Brockmann), 1922-1925
Taken from the last years of Imperial Germany, and through the Weimar Republic into the Nazi era, these rarely seen images by pioneering portrait photographer August Sander highlight just how wide his range was

By Tom May Published

A new exhibition marking the photographer's 150th anniversary digs into the lesser-known corners of his archive

Galleries and Exhibitions
Hand putting SD card into a card reader attached to a laptop on a desk
The best memory card readers in 2026: copy images and video to your computer

By Ben Andrews Last updated

Buying Guide These are the best memory card readers to supercharge your SD, CFexpress & CompactFlash memory card image transfers

Buying Guide
Film still from the 2026 movie The Girl with the Leica
New film 'The Girl with the Leica' reminds the world that photographer "Robert Capa" wasn't a real person, but a shared byline that almost erased Gerda Taro's name from history

By Tom May Published

News Premiering at Venice Bienale, the movie retells the story of a real-life female photographer whose shots were credited to someone else.

News
A extreme close-up of two young downy eagle owl chicks nestled together, one squawking with its beak wide open to reveal a pink mouth while the other rests with its eyes closed
This bird's fearsome, wide-open beak looks like it's picking a fight – but actually it's just a chick asking for food

By Tom May Published

NEWS Philipp Egger spent years returning to the same nest, working unseen, until he captured this dramatic shot.

NEWS
A black and white photograph taken through a car window of a young woman leaning out, her hand raised to her hair, as other passengers sit behind her.
Photographer Henry Wessel modified his camera so he could shoot one-handed through the windshield while driving on his daily commute – and according to him, "A glance was enough"

By Tom May Published

A new exhibition in New York revisits the portfolio Henry Wessel built traffic with one hand on the wheel

Galleries and Exhibitions
A colour photograph of a weathered green child's tricycle parked on a driveway in front of a suburban house.
William Eggleston's photographs were once voted the most hated of the year – but this new retrospective proves just how wrong critics can be

By Tom May Published

News The London exhibition marks 50 years since critics called Eggleston's color photographs "banal" and "boring"

News
Square [hotos of bright red caravan and of a green Art Deco library building
How a photographer who shoots caravans and snooker clubs landed praise from Robert Plant – and an exhibition inside a heritage museum

By Tom May Published

NEWS Tom Hicks' photos of Black Country signage and shopfronts attracted unlikely support from a Led Zeppelin legend

NEWS
A man in a long coat stands alone at a street corner beside a fire hydrant, facing a row of cinema marquees advertising old films.
Baldwin Lee waited until the streets of New York had emptied of people, then took these photos with a 4x5 view camera that have sat unseen for 47 years

By Tom May Published

NEWS A new exhibition reveals how, in the 1970s, the Chinese-American photographer used a slow, tripod-bound camera to shoot the Big Apple at its quietest moments

NEWS
Kodak 35mm film slide viewer photographed on cluttered table
The best slide viewers in 2026: the easy way to rediscover your old slides

By Gavin Stoker Last updated

Buying guide Whether you wish to view old pictures or are shooting on film afresh today, these are the best slide viewers

Buying guide
A polar bear peers through a seal's breathing hole in Arctic ice, its face framed by ice, water and rising bubbles as seen from below the surface.
This haunting photo shows what a seal would see in their last moments – just before the polar bear launches a deadly attack

By Tom May Published

Award winner Meet the polar bear who found a hidden camera under Arctic ice, looked it dead in the eye, then fell asleep above it for nine hours

Award winner
Street portraits from the book Street Photography Africa
This rule-breaking book about African street photography splices catwalk-ready fashion shots in with candid documentary, and it's hard to tell where one ends and one begins

By Tom May Published

News A new release from Thames & Hudson challenges our assumptions about what street photography actually is

News
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Mital Patel spent years photographing the two remaining northern white rhinos on Earth. Yet his work isn't just about animals; it tells us a lot about humans, too

By Tom May Published

NEWS A new online exhibition teams a wildlife extinction story with a study of the people guarding it.

NEWS
Newspaper boy Ned Parfett sells copies of the Evening News telling of the Titanic maritime disaster, outside Oceanic House, the London offices of the Titanic’s owner, the White Star Line, in Cockspur Street, London, 16th April 1912. Six years later Parfett died whilst serving in France during World War I. He was killed in a German bombardment on 29th October 1918, 13 days before the end of the War. (Photo by Topical Press Agency/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
The most famous face of the Titanic disaster belongs to a newsboy nobody thought to name – taken by a photographer nobody credited, either

By Tom May Published

famous photos The fame of Ned Parfett's photo has outlived him by over a century

famous photos
Bresser Biolux NV microscope
The best microscope in 2026: Perfect for students, kids and photographers

By Adam Juniper Last updated

Buying guide Explore inner space, educate your children, and shoot macro images with the best microscopes

Buying guide
Visa pour l'Image photography festival loses its founder: why Jean-François Leroy's passing is a huge loss to photojournalism

By Tom May Published

Obituary The man who launched the world's biggest photojournalism festival has died aged 69

Obituary
3BHBBXW MARTIN PARR in I AM MARTIN PARR (2024), directed by LEE SHULMAN. Credit: Haut et Court Doc / Album
The seaside town that once called Martin Parr's photographs a betrayal is about to put his face on a mural the size of a building

By Tom May Published

News New Brighton is raising funds for a permanent mural honouring the late street photographer

News
An older man holding a camera and a woman stand together in a grassy field under a cloudy sky with concerned expressions.
Movies featuring real-life photographers don't always hit the right notes, but new Netflix movie H for Hawk gets Fleet Street legend Alisdair Macdonald spot on

By Tom May Published

Brendan Gleeson plays the real Daily Mirror shooter, whose actual pictures anchor this Claire Foy grief drama

Photojournalism
GoPro Mission 1 Pro vs DJI Osmo Action 6 vs Insta360 Ace Pro 2
GoPro Mission 1 Pro vs DJI Osmo Action 6 vs Insta360 Ace Pro 2: Which action camera deserves your cash?

By Tom May Published

VERSUS Got action camera overwhelm? This GoPro Mission 1 Pro vs DJI Osmo Action 6 vs Insta360 Ace Pro 2 showdown should clear things up

VERSUS
A publicity still from the BBC drama Einstein and Eddington shows David Tennant as Eddington and Andy Serkis as Einstein, standing together in period suits in front of a chalkboard.
Andrew Crommelin and Charles Davidson took the photograph that proved Einstein right about the universe in 1919. So why does history only remember Arthur Eddington's name?

By Tom May Published

FEATURE The photographer who gets the credit isn't always the one who took the decisive shot

FEATURE
Insta360 Luna Ultra and DJI Pocket 4P gimbal cameras on a park wall
DJI Osmo Pocket 4P vs Insta360 Luna Ultra – Which twin-lens pocket gimbal camera is the best?

By Tom May, Adam Juniper Published

VERSUS How do these dual-lens, pocket gimbal cameras compare? We pit the DJI Osmo Pocket 4P vs Insta360 Luna Ultra to see which is the right choice for you

VERSUS
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