Landscape technique

Two options:

Use the traditional wide angle lens that might not hold up to large prints if cropping is done.

Use a multi level photostitching technique that would allow for that severe cropping and still give the pixels for the large prints.

Opinions please.

Why would you want to crop a landscape shot? You have all the time in the world to set up your composition, then you wait for the right light. You should have your framing PERFECT in camera.

My landscape shoots usually take about a week of planning, and about 3 hours of setting up, composing, and sitting and waiting for the light. Get the framing right, and there's absolutely no reason why you should crop a landscape heavily.

I'd worry more about getting a shot worthy of being printed large than pixel count. Landscape photography is challenging but rewarding, and if you want truly gorgeous shots, it's the light, not the pixels, that will make the shot.

Photostiching is nice for panos, but doing it for the sake of getting more in the frame and getting more pixels is manifestly the wrong reason. It's also the wrong way to use a wide angle lens.

Read up about landscape composition, lighting, and actual technique, and don't worry about pixel peeping. Of all the photographic disciplines, you will be massively disappointed if you pixel peep landscapes. Work on your composition and understanding of light.

I love landscape photography more than anything else in the world, and I think you're approaching it in a completely misguided way here.

Perry my friend, it is inconceivable for me to think that this is the first time my idea may be misguided (delicate way of saying dumb), nor will it be the last.

Thanks for the direction.

BTW-what is your preferred lens?

chauncey wrote in post #5271700
Perry my friend, it is inconceivable for me to think that this is the first time my idea may be misguided (delicate way of saying dumb), nor will it be the last.

Thanks for the direction.

BTW-what is your preferred lens?

Depends entirely on the shot.

Pick the perspective you want first, and then decide on the focal length. After I'm in position, generally I use the 17-40L on the 5D, or Sigma 10-20 on a cropper, because ultra-wides let you emphasize foreground interest well, and lead the eye through the shot from beginning, middle, and end, using leading lines as compositional tools.

But I really like using the 200L for landscapes too, especially to emphasize background that can get lost in the frame when using too wide an angle.

But I really like using the 200L for landscapes too, especially to emphasize background that can get lost in the frame when using too wide an angle.[/QUOTE]

Does that mean that you want th background to hold the eye, rather than the foreground?

Chauncey:

If I may be so bold, I will suggest that you find a copy of this book:

http://www.amazon.com …oks&qid=1207525​997&sr=1-1

It is not only full of great images, but it's full of useful information for a landscape photographer. I'm sure that there are others as useful, but I can vouch for this one.

I've looked in bookstores and libraries since I bought it a year ago, but haven't found a better one.


One comment I would have about a 200 mm FL, is that the DOF will be dreadfully shallow. Here's an excerpt from the book on that topic:

"The image will be most arresting if it displays sharply from front to back. This can be accomplished by shooting at the smallest aperture to maximize depth of field, and by focusing about one third of the way into the picture space to center the in-focus zone over the framed area. Use your cameras' depth-of-field preview feature to check results in the viewfinder".

[quote=perryge;5271589]​Why would you want to crop a landscape shot? You have all the time in the world to set up your composition, then you wait for the right light. You should have your framing PERFECT in camera.

My landscape shoots usually take about a week of planning, and about 3 hours of setting up, composing, and sitting and waiting for the light. Get the framing right, and there's absolutely no reason why you should crop a landscape heavily.

I'd worry more about getting a shot worthy of being printed large than pixel count. Landscape photography is challenging but rewarding, and if you want truly gorgeous shots, it's the light, not the pixels, that will make the shot.

Thanks for bringing this up! My family still talks about the 2 hours it took for me to take a sunset shot in the mountains, and its been about 3 yrs ago.
I would show them this but they would only say that there's someone out there with the same illness that I have.

Looks interesting to this neophyte, http://www.photoacute.​com/index.html

chauncey wrote in post #5274122
Looks interesting to this neophyte, http://www.photoacute.​com/index.html

To be honest, I'm a bit skeptical about the claims this software makes (it seems too good to be true - and we know what that means).

First off under the name Photo Acute it reads; "MORE PIXELS". Well, I guess we've been wasting our money on anything higher than 3.0 MP.

My comments in ( ).

1. Image resolution increase beyond camera capabilities. (Creating something from nothing?)

2. Noise reduction without losing image details. (first software to accomplish this that I've heard of).

3. Images alignment on sub-pixel level. (and I always thought the pixel was the smallest element in a digital image).

4. Expanding DOF (focus stacking) (This software is available for free)

http://hadleyweb.pwp.b​lueyonder.co.uk/CZM/Ne​ws.htm

5. Chromatic aberrations correction (standard in Lightroom and PS)

6. Fixing handshaking artifacts in low light conditions. (sounds as though they are making something up here but I could be wrong).

I've bookmarked the page and will try it when I get my other sh*t together.

chauncey wrote in post #5271905
Does that mean that you want th background to hold the eye, rather than the foreground?

Not quite. Ideally you wanna move around to get the perspective you want before deciding on focal length, but that's not always possible. Sometimes wide angle lenses make objects in the distant background (which you can't get closer to for whatever reason) just look too small. E.g. the sun. A tele will let you fill the frame more with that kinda stuff, which can look great. In this shot, the sun would have looked tiny and filled up much less of the frame if I had used a wide angle. It's not a very good shot, I know, but it illustrates the point:

IMAGE LINK: http://www.flickr.com …in/set-72157602322766899/

Mike R wrote in post #5273905
Thanks for bringing this up! My family still talks about the 2 hours it took for me to take a sunset shot in the mountains, and its been about 3 yrs ago.
I would show them this but they would only say that there's someone out there with the same illness that I have.

It's better than shooting a sunrise. Try waking them up at 3:30 in the morning and setting up for 3 hours just so you can shoot during that 15 minute period of magical light, or go home disappointed only to try again the next day.