How to Get the Most Out of Your Wide Angle Lens in Landscape Photography

When it comes to landscape photography, the lens of choice is normally a wide angle. You can create fantastic images with them, but they come with their own challenges as well. This excellent video tutorial will show you how to get the most out of your wide angle lens when shooting landscape images. 

Coming to you from Andrew Marr, this awesome video tutorial will show you how to get more out of your wide angle lens, particularly when shooting landscape photos. By far, the most common mistake I see landscape photographers make when using a wide angle lens is not including a foreground subject of some sort. The problem is that wide angle lenses tend to push the background away, and without something in the foreground, the image can end up feeling a bit empty. It does not need to be anything big; often, just a well-placed rock or flower that gives the viewer's eye a place to enter the photo can do the trick. Check out the video above for the full rundown from Marr. 

And if you really want to dive into landscape photography, check out "Photographing The World 1: Landscape Photography and Post-Processing with Elia Locardi." 

Alex Cooke's picture

Alex Cooke is a Cleveland-based portrait, events, and landscape photographer. He holds an M.S. in Applied Mathematics and a doctorate in Music Composition. He is also an avid equestrian.

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I carry the Sony 1224mm f/4 and the 24240mm as a impromptu combo for everyday but also have a Voigtlander 10mm f/5.6. What is the most important to remember with wide and ultra wide/ultra-ultra wide is " It is not about getting it all in the frame"! Your eyes are 50-55mm all in focus BUT with your peripheral you can see almost 180 degrees and that is what throws your mind off, but even at just 35mm things/horizon can look very far away. The secret like you show is to find a close subject BUT with a great wide background. A 10mm is great for Horseshoe Canyon where most are on the cliff's edge doing a pano's in a breeze/wind to get the water below also (gear as been lost) or in a slot canyon with 12mm where you can lay your camera pointing up and get the ground all around and the sky above! It is tempting to use for indoors shot but side distortion (wider windows) is not real looking so a indoor pano is best but if you can get close to a subject the background less of an issue. There is one example that will bring to memory 1st no lens will capture all that you see and the size of things, Do a sunrise with your widest but do a bracketed then process the sun will be so small. 2nd use a 50mm to capture a moonrise above the magnifying horizon with the moon in focus not blown out and look at its size and the landscape captured, the moon will be smaller than seen and the landscape will be less than what was seen. The solution for it is a 12 or 16mm shot with foreground in focus with the moon unfocused then blend a moon sizing no bigger than the blown out - this was done in the film days today the correct size is with a 400/600mm. To get a moon in focus SS/ISO 125 f/8 with any mm, have even done with a 10mm mainly for the wide landscape. All examples of what you see can not be captured no matter how hard you try in a single capture.