Photographers often chase the "best" camera gear or ask, "what settings did you use?" in hopes of improving their own landscape photography. Mastering your tools is an ingredient of stunning images but not the only one. Acute awareness of your environment is also a key component.
Knowing the fundamentals of photography and your camera are part of mastering the craft but certainly not the only elements that must be learned. Simon Baxter, a master woodlands photographer, talks about mastering awareness and how it impacts one's images in landscape photography.
Baxter discusses awareness and how a child sees the world, relating it to his own childhood experiences. From here, he links the concept to how he sees the woodland scenes he photographs even today and how that awareness influences his work.
Baxter discusses a spotlight perception versus a lantern perception and how the two can impact a landscape photographer in the field as they experience the environment. He believes understanding awareness and how it can help or hurt a landscape photographer's view of the scene before them is a component of the pursuit of improvement.
I appreciated Baxter's take on the subject as I work to improve my photography and creative vision of surrounding scenes. Increased awareness of the natural environment helps with the quality of images and the overall child-like enjoyment of the whole process.
