LANDSCAPE PHOTOGRAPHY IS SIMPLE
News, tips, tutorials and short essays on landscape photography
“Landscape Photography is Simple” is the title of one my presentations, which I give regularly to camera clubs and photographic societies. In the talk I focus on the creative, or aesthetic side of landscape photography. Like lighting, composition and timing. In this space, however, I’m tackling all aspects, including technical details, equipment, preparation and planning, and more. In a nutshell, it’s about how I do what I do, and why I do it.
I honestly believe that landscape photography is indeed simple. And perhaps deceptively so, as often it’s not easy at the same time… I trust you’ll find my insights useful, and feel free to share your thoughts or suggestions for future articles.
Nothing to see here… Earlier this year I ran a photography workshop at a location in the South Downs National Park. We were lucky to get lots of sunshine on this spring afternoon. At the beginning of the session, one of the guests said to
It’s surprising how many photographers coming to my workshops, some with years of experience, never use Histogram in their workflow. When asked about it, they reply “sometimes” or “probably not as often as I should”. All euphemisms for “never”, really. Some admit to using it
Short Long Exposures is that an oxymoron?… Surely, the title is a contradiction in terms? How can exposures be short and long and the same time… But I promise there is some logic hidden in the title. And it will become clearer when we’ve examined
The Falmer Triangle – a photographic guide to the South Downs near Brighton Falmer / Woodingdean / Kingston near Lewes The “Falmer Triangle” – a triangular area between Falmer, Woodingdean, and Kingston near Lewes in East Sussex is where I started my exploration of the
INTRO So, what is the best light for landscape photography?… At the risk of stating the obvious – the title is somewhat tongue-in-cheek. There’s a myriad of conceivable potential landscape scenes, and even more inconceivable ones. All of which are not served equally well by
Telephoto Landscapes of the South Downs …AND WHAT MADE ME CHOOSE LANDSCAPE While South Downs landscapes taken with telephoto lenses have been a strong foundation of my body of work over the past 15 years, it wasn’t my first “serious” focus in photography. In reality,
INTRO Why is landscape photography difficult? Many beginners, and even seasoned photographers specialising in other areas, struggle with landscape photography. Composition is probably the number one cause of their frustration. So often it’s not obvious at all what should be the focus of your frame.
Why do my landscape photos look flat?… Obviously, photographs are usually flat (unless they’re wrapped around or projected on some curved or uneven surfaces). So, that explains everything… And still, compelling landscape images often exhibit a certain three-dimensional quality. Since the actual scene is represented
Case study: a telephoto landscape from conception to editing The image above is relatively old, taken one evening in early June of 2010. But I still quite vividly remember the outing, the decisions I made, and the hurdles I had to overcome. And I’d like
Knowing where to focus in landscape photography is important, and it seems to be an issue that many beginning, or even intermediate, photographers struggle with. We usually want everything in our scene to appear sharp, and depth of field is a finite resource, which needs
Why worry about contrast? If you’ve been taking photos for any length of time, you will have noticed that sometimes the camera fails to properly capture contrast in your scenes. Or in other words, sometimes the picture looks more contrasty than the scene did to
Case study: a seascape from idea to postproduction Everyone has a preferred way of learning. If you like learning by example and analysis of others’ work, and you feel you can improve your seascapes, then read on. As I shall explain in detail how I
What camera settings to use for landscape photography I’ve compiled a simple list of essential camera settings that I use in my landscape photography on a regular basis. But if you’re anything like me and you like to know not only what, but also why
Technically almost everything we see, and our cameras capture, is reflected light. Unless we happen to be looking straight into a light source. So I am referring to something more specific in the “magic of reflected light”. Perhaps you could call it secondary reflected light,
If you’ve ever tried to photograph a woodland, you’ll know that it’s not easy to do it justice in a still image. Woods and forests are visually busy environments. And that often makes carving meaningful compositions out of them a challenge. Moreover, if you try
I sometimes get confused looks when I ask my audiences, photography workshops guests or just friends interested in photography – do you know what “blue hour” is? I’ll try to explain what it means in this article, as it is one of my favourite lighting