Landscape Photography In Natural Light

Landscape Photography In Natural Light

Along with composition, the quality of light is perhaps the most important factor affecting the success of a landscape photograph. Whilst composition can be completely controlled, good quality light on the other hand cannot. We can however control the direction of the light and therefore use the optimum angle of light to enhance the appearance of our main subject and ultimately the success of our landscape photograph. There are four main types of lighting; top, side, front and back lighting. Consider how your envisaged scene will appear under each type of lighting and then choose which type of lighting will best portray your subject and shoot at the specific time and in the specific position to capture your subject in this light.

Occurring during the middle hours of the day:

Top Lighting

Generally speaking for landscape photography, top lighting is to be avoided as it does not cast any shadows and therefore does not convey texture, form and shape which are so important to emulate dimension in a landscape photograph. The only exception to using top lighting is when you wish to capture water at its most turquoise colour which occurs when the sun is positioned directly above.

Occurring leading-up to sunset and a short time after sunrise:

Front Lighting

Similar to top lighting front light also does not produce texture, form and shape and even worse your shadow will more than likely appear in the scene. Try and avoid this lighting in any situation.

Back-lighting

Composite Portraits with a Mythical Creature

Composite photography, layering together multiple images to make one, has long been used in the world of commercial photography as a way to produce perfectly composed photographs that would be too difficult to create in one shot. As more and more people are beginning to see the benefits of composite photography, the technique is finding it’s way into other styles of photography as well including portraiture. Composite photography opens up the door to creativity for many photographers, including this one who went so far as to build his own mythical creature to add to a young boy’s portraits. Take a look.

Bakster, the friendly mythical creature featured in the photoshoot was built using spray foam and faux fur. In real life, Bakster is only 3-feet tall; however, thanks to composite photography, Bakster appears to be much, much larger. In the video we see him towering over a building, an effect made possible by photographing him in studio then layering that image into the alley scene.

Wide Aperture Clicks

You should always shoot with your eyes wide open (at least, the one looking through the viewfinder). But often it pays to shoot with your lens wide open, too.

Wide apertures let in more light, so you can use a faster shutter speed in any given light level. This is handy for anything from low-light photography to action shooting.

Left: In this shot, selective focus directs the viewer's attention to the subject's eye(s). This was made with AF SLR, using a telephoto lens set at its widest aperture and closest focusing distance. Right: If the background is considerably darker than the subject, you can use exposure to mask distractions. Photos byLynne Eodice

Another benefit of shooting wide open is very limited depth of field. If you're shooting a portrait, and the background is distracting, and you can't move the subject or camera, just open the lens to its widest aperture, and the background distractions will magically blur into insignificance. This effect is greatest when you use a longer focal length and shoot at a close focusing distance--shoot a head shot from 4 feet away with a 100mm lens wide-open at f/2.8, and background distractions will vanish.