Finding quality sources of landscape photography tips and techniques is not difficult. Guidance and suggestions are available in abundance if you know where to look for them. If you are in the early stages of learning landscape photography, it can become overwhelming and lead to confusion. I know this from experience. My landscape photography journey, like most, started off with a point-and-shoot camera. Eventually, I longed for more, as the automation began to get in the way of the pictures I wanted to create. Taking a gamble, I invested in an uncharted hobby and purchased an entry-level DSLR.
Landscape Photography Ideas
With no real ambition towards landscape photography other than capturing interesting images, I began the gradual process of self-education through books paired with trial and error. Portions of what I read involving landscape photography seemed obvious (i.e. use a tripod, deep depth of field, arrive in good light), while other information seemed complex and confusing. Although I was happy with the images I was capturing, I still felt there was something I wasn’t doing correctly.
I began to see the most growth in my landscape photography when I stopped fearing my incompetency, and instead, turned my attention to what I was confident with. By not focusing on the possibility of holes in my technique, I gained a more holistic approach towards photography. Not only did it build strengths for me in other areas, but, the more photos I took, the more I began to see the need for the settings and techniques that, previously, were beyond my capabilities. By taking a step back, I was able to move three steps forward.
Landscape Photography Tips for Beginners
Here are some simplified landscape photography tips for refining your landscape images and creating long-term benefits for your photography:
Develop Your Workflow
There can be a surprisingly large number of considerations that go into taking a photograph and even more when taking a landscape photograph. Depth of field, speed of the shutter, ISO, auto or manual focus, where to focus, white balance, image stabilization on or off, mirror lock-up, metering, noise reduction, etc. For many of these settings, you can’t adjust one without it affecting others. Developing an order in which you think through setting considerations is an effective way to be sure that your camera is prepared to capture the image that you have envisioned
A good place to start when developing your workflow is to have it consist of fewer, more basic settings and slowly add to the flow as you become more comfortable with the application of each setting.
Landscape Photography Settings
For instance, being intentional with exposure (for the desired aperture or shutter speed), setting the focus (using autofocus or manual) and deciding whether image stabilization (if applicable) is necessary while leaving everything else in a basic or automatic mode, would create a good foundation towards understanding and confidence. DSLRs today have a lot of automation built into their settings to make their use more simplified. Take advantage of the automation available to you until you are at the level of understanding to know how a particular setting will affect your image.
Start with Basic Composition and Build on it
Composition is the most powerful tool for improving your images. Knowing how to deliberately organize the interest of an environment within the dimensions of a frame is the key ingredient to the development of a ‘photographer’s eye’. A lot of research has gone into the study of how people look at an image. Though art is very subjective, this research has provided a large number of proven methods to organize an image for the utmost pleasing layout for the eye to examine.
Similarly to developing your workflow, become familiar with a few of the forms of composition (i.e. rule of thirds, leading lines) and apply those to your images initially. Once organizing your images in those forms becomes more natural and requires less thought, introduce another compositional form into your photography. Over time, as your “eye” develops, you will be able to compose pictures very quickly and naturally. This will reduce the number of bad shots that you take and provide an overall consistency to the quality of your images.
Clean Up the Edges of Your Frame
One of the challenges facing landscape photographers is having distracting ob- jects within the frame or poking in from the edges that leave an image looking unpolished. Lone tree branches, tall grass around the edge of a lake or unkempt brush from an otherwise jaw-dropping overlook, are seemingly always there photobombing images. Allowing objects like these to creep into the edges of an image will interfere with and take away from the main subject.
If you pay attention, you will notice that good landscape photographers have very clean, polished images. The edges of their images have little to no distractions poking into the frame, and if there are, those objects are serving a compositional purpose towards the interest of the photo.
Have Everything in the Frame Serve a Purpose
Deciding what to include or not include in your image can be challenging, but it can be what really allows a photographer to have their work stand out among others. How do you decide what should be included and what should not? One method is to set your camera up and compose the image, scan the frame and ask yourself, ‘Does everything in the frame serve a purpose?’
There may be instances in which having an undesired object in your frame is inevitable. In cases like these, arrange those objects so they serve a role in the composition. If there is a tree in the way, use the rule of thirds to give stability to the image. If there is an outcropping of rocks, try to position yourself so they form a leading line. Aligning the objects within the frame and giving them purpose, without the convenience of relying on removing them in post-processing is a method which isn’t always the easiest, but is the most rewarding.
Scrutinize with a Critic’s Eye
When looking at your images, ask yourself how they could have been improved. Could the exposure have been more balanced? Could there be a more dramatic sky? Did you go at the right time of day? Is the foreground too busy? Should you have used a long exposure? A shorter exposure?
These are all ways to prevent reaching a point of complacency. It may be subtle at first, but when you look back on older photographs, you will begin to see ways in which your images could have been improved.
Enjoy Where you are in Your Landscape Photography Journey
We all seek to improve our photography. Whether it be through landscape photography tips, upgraded equipment, different techniques, new post-processing programs or trial and error. If you are like most, it may not be feasible to constantly update your photography arsenal with state-of-the-art camera bodies and lenses. This may sound like a disadvantage, but it doesn’t have to be. Understanding the correlation of your camera’s settings and simply having patience can, not only improve your images but accelerate your growth as a photographer.
Final Thoughts
Remember, it is not necessarily the amount of knowledge or tips you have about landscape photography, but how you apply it. To prevent task saturation, narrow the process to within your capabilities and allow room for growth. Part of the joy of landscape photography is simply being outside with a purpose. When you have confidence in your own process, you are free to keep your mind focused on your surroundings, allowing the world to pose for you.
Matthew Koehnemann – Originally from Florida, I moved to Atlanta 7 years ago to begin my career in the aviation industry. Like most people who travel often, I enjoyed taking pictures of the different locations that I ventured. Disenchanted with touristy snapshots, I began to take a look closer at what made a stronger photograph, images that were unique but relatable, learning from each picture. The slow, but progressive rewards of this discipline soon developed into a passionate hobby which grew as I learned to capture, in camera, photos that I had only previously envisioned in my mental repertoire. In a world of quality cell phone cameras and overly HDRed post-processing, stunning photography is constantly around us, thus making “well-composed accidents” more common and publicized. I strive to produce photographs that have a strong sense of realism and a touch of nostalgia, attempting to bring order to the messy chaos of the ever-changing worldly environment. From this artistic foundation, I believe that fine art photography should be veritably intentional and inquisitive, remaining familiar enough to recognize but abstract enough to be interpreted as new. It is my ambition to achieve this balance in each photograph, breathing a fresh, memorable life into familiar locations.
