First Time Landscape shots: Advice? 6D content and 24-105

Any advice, or any previous threads would be greatly appreciated.

I am going on a trip out to LA this weekend.

My question is, I want the sharpest landcape shots I can get and I want them to be great shots I can do a canvas print and hang up in my apt.

So my question is, I've messed with HDR in camera but that's obviously only in JPG

Any pointers for how to do landscape shots? I usually take photos of people and not objects or scapes so I don't want bokeh or oof areas really. I want sharp and crips with great colors.

I've seen great work with the 24-105 in this respect. Should I buy one of those pink filters for the front of my lens? Or is it best to just shoot RAW and adjust sky ect in post? Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

I know it's short notice but I really want to make these pictures count. Thanks!

I would be looking to use a tripod and focussing with live view for a start. A cable release or a remote shutter trigger would also assist sharp photos. F11-f16 on AV should give you a good depth of field.....

Im sure theres lots more members on here with heaps more experience than me who will chime in with advice.....

For equipment, a sturdy tripod and quality ballhead will improve your shots more than anything else. Add an inexpensive cable release, too -- off brand releases can be found online for under $10. Stop your lens aperture down for deeper depth of field. Bracket your exposures.

The most important items for good landscapes, though, are composition and lighting. You can get all the technical details correct, but can still end up with a boring photo if the composition and/or lighting are not interesting. Shooting in the morning and evenings will usually give you better lighting, but that does not mean you will never find scenes of interest in the middle of the day. The lighting just may be more challenging.

Read up on the Rule of Thirds for composition. It is a good starting point, but there are times when it is more interesting to break the rule, too. Knowing when to follow or break the rules comes with experience. Learning how to capture quality landscapes takes time and practice.

where in LA?

A tripod, cable release are a good start. In my experience, the cheap knock offs are NOT worth the money. If you do buy the knock-offs, buy 4 of them, as they will break. Just my experience.

Composition and lighting are important as is post processing. Joshua Tree NP isn't that far from LA. The beaches are kinda boring down there for photography in my opinion, but I live close to world class locations Do NOT use autofocus for landscapes. manually focusing will get you far better results and more percise as well. I don't ever use LV, but most all my buddies do.

Just got myself a 5D MarkIII for the very same thing recently, so there will be similarities because we have the same lens. Been doing landscapes for a wee while now.

I find using a really sturdy tripod as others have said. Using Live view is important too, pressing the info button a few times to get the histogram up too really helps you keep control of the darks and lights. Most of the time you'll be doing a blend of several images. It's sometimes unavoidable in landscape.

I've always been taught to light a landscape from the side, and I bought a B+W circulating polarizing filter to help with glare and haze.

Landscapes are about great background work, and less about the gear. Using the Photographers Ephemeris app is extremely helpful. Scout out a location you want to visit. Look at it on Google Earth first, then check the Photographers ephemeris for the times that the sun rises, and sets. This will also tell you the suns position at each minute of the day. This is vitally important to get the right light.

I found the below video amazing in just picking up a few pointers. Helps that Michael is quite light hearted about it too
The Basics of Nature Photography by Michael Melford

There's loads of different sub genres to landscape. Waterscapes, cityscapes, long exposures, hillwalking, mountainscapes, travel and many more. It's good to find the one you really like, because you'll save yourself from a lot of sitting in front of a computer saying "It's just not right"

With regards to sharp front to back with the 24-105L I find that apertures between f/11 and f/16 are pretty good. Set your AF to about a third into the scene for general guidelines at first. The DOF preview button can help a wee bit.

Planning is totally key to getting it right. Watch the weather, the light via the app and sometimes even just call a business in the area to ask how the weather is lol.

Hope that helps.

Paul

I third the f11-f16 with that lens on FF, not just for the DOF, but for decent corners and more even sharpness across the frame.

Great advice here so far

One thing I do is plan on taking shots in the early morning or evening for the best light. I play tourist during the day and scout out the shots I want so I know where to be at sunset/sunrise.

If I know I am going to a particular spot, I often check out the images already online or on google to see what others have done. For example say you want a shot of a particular pier and beach. Checking online you see that this pier looks great in the evening. So I would get down there during the day to see how it looks and where I want to be.

As far as the actual shooting....yes f8 at least. Two filters you might consider is a neutral density or polarizer. Both of those are hard to duplicate in post. I would shoot RAW and expose one for the sky and one for the foreground (+3,0,-3) and blend them in the program of your choice. I use the Enfuse plugin for Lighroom...