The best Lens for Landscape Photography - How to use a Wide-Angle Lens
As landscape photographers, we often seek the vast and dramatic locations to capture them in our images.
Whether it's a massive mountain range or a deep canyon, we ideally want to get it all in a single photograph.
The best type of lens to capture as much in one frame as possible is a wide-angle lens. Usually, they start at around 24mm and go down to 11mm, depending on the brand you're using.
Everything below 16mm is already super-wide, and it makes it tougher to compose your image, to make it still look appealing. There are a few things to keep in mind about using a wide-angle lens the "right" way, and that's what I'm going to cover in this short article.
Watch out for distractions
First of all, it's so important to watch out for any distractions which might be in your Frame.
I'm mainly talking about the edges.
Don't put anything there, which doesn't make sense
or what could confuse the viewer, for example cut off buildings, rocks, or super bright spots of light.
Try to keep your edges as clean as possible and only put stuff there, which helps the viewer to understand the purpose of your shot. Like trees which nicely frame the central point of interest.
Think about what benefits the Image
As I mentioned before, it's crucial to watch out for any distractions which could be in your frame, and it's equally essential to only include subjects that your image benefits from.
I'm talking about an exciting foreground subject, for example. Take a look at the image below, and you'll see what I mean by that.
I included the small creek in the immediate foreground as a good anchor point for the viewer's eye, which leads them towards the epic mountain peaks.
I focused mainly on the foreground, midground, and background to keep it as clean as possible. If I had included any cut off trees or plants on the edges, they would have been very distracting for the viewer. I used a vertical composition to avoid this issue.
So always think about what benefits the scene.
Don't include stuff just for the sake of including it.
Use the rule of thirds to compose your shot
A wide-angle lens makes it super easy to just include everything in your image, which you see right in front of you.
However, it's still very important to keep in mind that you want to capture an interesting composition, so the viewer has a pleasant experience looking at your photograph.
The rule of thirds helps you to avoid making those mistakes. Try to use the grid view of your camera so you can accurately see where to put the horizon line or an interesting subject in the background.
I'm not saying that you have to use this rule every single time, but it's an excellent starting point for sure.
Take a look at the image down below as an example.
I placed the horizon line close to the upper horizontal line of the grid and, at the same time, put the mountain close to the top-left intersection.
This helped me to make sure not to include too much sky.
It's essential to find the right balance between foreground and background to avoid creating boring compositions.
Get low and close to your foreground
One of the best ways to use a wide-angle lens is to emphasize your foreground element.
For instance, when you have some super small chunks of ice that you want to appear bigger in your frame, simply get low and close with your lens to the subject.
The wider your lens the more dramatic your foreground will look like.
In this sample image, I got super close to the foreground ice structures and the small pond to make it a prominent part of my composition.
The pond wasn't even as big as a football, but it looks quite large because of the 14mm focal length.
Pay attention to the depth of field
When you use your wide-angle lens, you usually don't have to pay much attention to your depth of field.
The wide focal length makes it easier to just focus somewhere in the middle of the frame, and you're usually fine when using apertures of around f11.
However, if you're super low with your tripod and very close to the foreground subject, the situation changes completely.
That's were proper focus stacking comes into play.
For this image, I had to use five different focal points to overcome the depth of field issue.
Make sure to take some more shots than needed (just in case) because you can always sort them out later on your computer.
My advanced focus stacking technique is a big topic in my Photoshop Masterclass, so make sure to check it out!
Use a tripod without a center column
As I mentioned a couple of times already, to get the most out of your wide-angle lens, it's super important to get close to your foreground subject.
If you want to make it possible, it's essential to have a tripod without or with a removable center collum, so your free to use it however you want it.
I found it quite annoying in the past when my tripod didn't let me go lower than 40cm of the ground because of that column.
Remove it, and you'll be fine, at least for your wide-angle photography.
Pay attention to your background subject
There is one more important point I want to mention in this article, and it's about paying close attention to your background subject.
When you compose your image while being super close to your foreground, it can happen that you "lose" your background. Huge distant mountains will suddenly appear tiny, or trees might get distorted in a weird way.
It's always a balancing act to overcome this effect and, of course, depends on what's more important to you.
If you want the viewer to focus mostly on the foreground, then fine, but if your background is also relevant, then you might have to step a bit further away from your front and use a longer focal length of 24mm or more.
This distortion effect can also benefit you sometimes, though. Distant mountains will appear super small in your frame when using a focal length of 20mm or less, but this won't be the case when you're close to them.
In the example image, I used the distortion effect of my 14mm lens to make the peaks appear even more significant than they actually were,
Simply tilt your lens up and down and see what it does with the background.
Please keep in mind that this only happens when you're quite close to your background subject!
Alright, that's it with my short guide about how to use a wide-angle lens.
Personally, I can say that I love using focal lengths of 20mm or less because it helps me so much to include foreground elements that are usually super small or almost hidden from your eyes!
So what's your favorite lens to use in landscape photography, and how often do you use it? Feel free to let me know down in the comments!
P.S. Feel free to check out my in-depth Ebook - Mastering Composition for Landscape Photographer!
