Landscape photography is traditionally done with a wide angle lens in order to capture the majority of the scene in the frame, and while there is nothing wrong with that approach, you can make images that are just as visually interesting with longer focal lengths. This excellent video shows how one photographer uses a supertelephoto zoom lens to create minimalist landscape photos.
Coming to you from Mads Peter Iversen, this great video tutorial will show you how he uses a 100-400mm lens for minimalist landscape photography. The beauty of using such long focal lengths for landscape work is that there are so many interesting individual elements in any given scene that you can often create dozens of photographs without even moving your feet. And more so, because we are so used to seeing landscape images shot with wide angle lenses, it can be refreshing for viewers to see an image shot at a more unusual focal length and can help your work stand out from the crowd a bit. Check out the video above for the full rundown from Iversen.
And if you really want to dive into landscape photography, check out "Photographing The World 1: Landscape Photography and Post-Processing with Elia Locardi."
I have done this too but it seems to work better in colder climates. In California you often get blur from warm air when you shoot longer distances.
You will get it at any temperature when the sun is out. The temperature difference between the heated surface and the air next to it causes heat waves. High Res cameras and long lenses/ long distances suffer the most. I could open a gallery of soft photos because of heat refraction.
Exactly right. Heat distortion doesn't happen in hot weather any more than it does in cold weather. I get extreme, image-ruining heat distortion when I shoot in northern Montana in November and December when the temperatures are well below freezing.