Pixiq

Equipment Checklist

• Sturdy tripod (preferably carbon fiber), monopod and a bean bag
• Shutter release cable
• Two camera bodies (one for wide-angle zoom; one for long lenses)
• Wide-angle zoom for foregrounds (Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L II USM)
• Medium-zoom for postcards (Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM)
• Filters: polarizer, blue-gold polarizer, grad-ND, vari-ND
• Lens hoods for flare
• Rain hood for camers and lenses
• Camera backpack with rain cover

Love Your Tripod

If you are still asking yourself, “Do I need my tripod?” then you don’t love your tripod. Invest in a new one today. It should be light enough to carry comfortably, sturdy enough to steady the camera, have a ballhead-style adjustment, come with a quick-release plate for ease of use and a shoulder strap for carrying it.

From a technical standpoint, good lighting for landscapes is also low light, and therefore you will need a tripod to ensure that your images are as sharp as they need to be. Additionally, a deep DOF requires slower shutter speeds; a tripod is a necessity in these situations.

Combined with the technical logic, the real reason to carry a tripod is that it slows you down and makes you more selective in your approach. Once settled on a composition, working with a tripod also helps you become more patient. When your camera is set up and in position, you are more likely to fine-tune your compositions, check the edges and study the frame for distracting elements.

Remote Shutter Release

Some of the best compositions are easily ruined by camera shake from the physical act of pushing the shutter. This is because the best landscapes are shot in low light at slow shutter speeds, making the camera vulnerable to movement while the shutter is open. Avoid creating camera shake by using a shutter release cable.   

Hint: You can also use the camera’s self-timer function to trigger the shutter button. Set the time to 2 seconds so that every time you push the shutter button the shutter will release 2 seconds later. This method works best for shooting landscapes more than other subjects.

The Right Lens

Think about lens choice carefully. Too often we are stuck in our ways, looking at the world through our favorite lens, which usually is the one on your camera in the moment. Take the time to change lenses. To avoid changing lenses in the field, many photographers work with two camera bodies, one with a wide-angle lens attached, and one with a medium-telephoto zoom. This also helps to minimize sensor dust because you aren’t exposing the sensor to the elements. However, if you don’t have two camera bodies, minimize the risk of sensor dust by following a few simple guidelines: turn the camera off before you remove a lens; leave the camera pointed down while changing lenses; and work quickly (this is where being very familiar with your equipment becomes even more important).

Wide-Angle Lenses: Wide-angles emphasize foreground elements and create a sense of space in an image. These are great lens choices for big skies and large bodies of water.

Medium Lenses: Medium lenses create images that most resemble how our eyes view the world. The classic landscape photographers rely on medium lenses, in a range anywhere from 50 to 200mm. This is the postcard look, so to go one step further find composition elements that can help frame the scene, like a tree or canyon wall.

Filters for Landscapes

Filters still play an important role in digital world of nature photography, and they are especially effective when shooting landscapes. My goal in using filters is to control and modify the natural light without the final images looking filtered. Beware of temptation: it’s easy to get seduced by filters and push it too far. To give yourself a choice back home in the digital darkroom, always shoot a series of shots with and without the filters.

Polarizer: Use a polarizing filter to darken blue skies, emphasize clouds and to control reflections on water and wet vegetation, as well as bring down overly bright highlights.

Blue-Gold Polarizer: To add a touch of gold or blue to scenes with muted color, use Singh-Ray’s blue-gold polarizer, then adjust the color balance in Lightroom to the desired look. This filter can definitely push the color over the top, so it’s best to shoot in RAW to have the most control.

Graduated Neutral Density (grad-ND): Balance bright skies and dark foregrounds with a grad-ND. This half-gray/half-clear filter balances the light by holding back the exposures of bright skies. This helps to bring up the exposure values of the foreground relative to the sky. I find a 2-stop, hard-step, grad-ND best for scenes with a distinct horizon. The soft-step grad-ND works bests for landscapes with no distinct boundary, like wildflower meadows and sweeping panoramas.

Variable Neutral Density (vari-ND): To capture motion blur at slow shutter speeds, use Singh-Ray’s vari-ND, which allows you to control the amount of light passing through the lens. The vari-ND filter simplifies achieving slow shutter speeds, even on a bright day. I use it for waterfalls to create motion blur and also for shooting waves along the coast.