How does one get such crisp landscape photographs?

ChrisGilbert said:
The assertion was that to get a crisp landscape shot you need good light. I am challanging that assertion. You can get a crisp landscape shot in *any* light if you use the camera correctly.

There is an entirely different argument to be had about the value of the end result, which is inevitably affected by the conditions you have but this can be either a positve or negative efftect. All conditions deliver both good and bad opportunities. Writing off the conditions in front of you simply because they don't appear to meet expected criteria is self-limiting. Photography has many different vectors, all of which can be seperated out and worked with individually.
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Tell me how you would go about getting a crisp landscape image with flat, dull uninspiring light. You simply can't pull contrast and detail out of nowhere...
 
ChrisGilbert said:
You are confusing light with contrast.
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Are you really saying light and contrast are entirely different things? I mean, really? In every single other photographic situation I can think of one is the direct cause of the other and how much contrast you have is purely, entirely, 100% dependant on what light you have. Be it artificial or natural light, it's still dependant on light.

Are you honestly, genuinely saying getting the same contrast shooting a scene at mid day in summer and 5am on a cold October morning is merely a case of knowing your camera well?
 
PMN said:
Are you really saying light and contrast are entirely different things?
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They are indeed. Shoot across the sun on a well lit day and you get good contrast. Turn the camera through 90 degrees and shoot with the sun behind you and the contrast disappears. And what about an overhead sun ? It's perfectly feasible to have a well-illuminated landscape with low contrast. That's why, as you know, it's usually better to shoot at sunrise and sunset. The contrast is better.

PMN said:
In every single other photographic situation I can think of one is the direct cause of the other and how much contrast you have is purely, entirely, 100% dependant on what light you have.
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Put something dark against a light background and even in bad light you get good contrast. That's not reliant on the presence of good illumination. That's simply intrinsic contrast. Something that can be exploited very easily by a photographer even when the illumination is poor.

PMN said:
Are you honestly, genuinely saying getting the same contrast shooting a scene at mid day in summer and 5am on a cold October morning is merely a case of knowing your camera well?
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That wasn't the argument. The argument was that light was the single most important factor in getting a crisp landscape and that simply isn't the case, which is what I said earlier in the thread. Even a well illuminated landscape requires technique and knowhow to deliver as a crisp landscape image. It is also perfectly possible to render a poorly lit landscape well using the same technique. There is no single factor, it's a combination but the fact that you can render a good, sharp landscape in poor light to me makes illumination subordinate to technique.
 
ChrisGilbert said:
That wasn't the argument.
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It's what you're implying in your reply though!


ChrisGilbert said:
They are indeed. Shoot across the sun on a well lit day and you get good contrast. Turn the camera through 90 degrees and shoot with the sun behind you and the contrast disappears.
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Yes, correct. Why? Because the light your camera is seeing has changed. ;)
 
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Just returned from my local beach the camera remained in bag due to there being no decent light to capture, flat as a pancake one could put it.
 
PMN said:
Yes, correct. Why? Because the light your camera is seeing has changed. ;)
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Quite so. You've changed your point of view and can no longer see the contrasting part of the scene. You now have luminosity without contrast, which was the point I was making. They are different things and you can have one without the other.
 
You said ...

> Are you really saying light and contrast are entirely different things?

I said Yes. I gave you an example of how light and contrast can be seperated in the field with the camera.

I also went on to give you an example of how you can have contrast without illumination by using things that are intrinsically light and dark and whose luminosity is not dependant on good light.

For the sake of brevity and avoiding the need to reread the entire thread - and just to make sure that I'm not being misunderstood - I'll restate my position. Good light is subordinate to good technique. It is perfectly possible to create good landscapes without good light. Equally, it is perfectly possible to create rubbish landscapes with good light when you don't know what you are doing.

Now whether you want to agree with me on that really really doesn't matter. We all do what we want to do and we usually end up doing it our own way. If I'm doing it differently to the way that other people do it then that's fine. I'm very happy with that.
 
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ChrisGilbert said:
You said ...

> Are you really saying light and contrast are entirely different things?
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This is getting silly. You very clearly implied that the light has no bearing on the contrast of the scene and I'm not the only one who took it that way. You're now saying that if you move the camera the contrast changes, well of course it does because you're changing how it sees the light. :bang:
 
For the shots you see on the web, you could shoot at f/64 and you wouldn't notice.

Most 'amazingly sharp' images are actually so because of clever use of light and shade. Classic examples of where a light object sits in front of a dark background or vice versa.

Marc Adamus' image below

http://www.marcadamus.com/images/large/The-Beginning.jpg

Shows a great example of light and against dark and the converse. It also has just the right amount of sharpening for the size of image without having any halos but that is secondary to the use of light.

Use of contrast is also important - having great dynamic range in a camera is great for some things but use all of that dynamic range and you end up with very little global contrast. Use a film like velvia 50 that only has a few stops of dynamic range and you find conditions that work and the resulting contrast and natural saturation in the image will increase impact. You can do the same with your digital camera by finding conditions without too much contrast and then increasing the contrast in photoshop afterwords.

Little tricks like using slightly diffuse light when a cloud is just starting to cove the sun can help - softens shadows and decreases dynamic range.
 
Not the famous Mr Parkin, surely?

I think a distinction needs to made between "crisp" and "sharp".

In my opinion, "crisp" can be related to atmospheric conditions - for example after the passage of a cold front, when in common usage the word crisp is often used to describe the quality of the air.

"Sharp" tends to imply correct photographic technique.

The two are related, of course, but no matter how sharp an image is it cannot compensate for fuzzy atmospheric conditions.
 
timparkin said:
but use all of that dynamic range and you end up with very little global contrast.
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Which is why most over processed HDR images look awful. Every element of the picture ends up at a middle tone losing the original distinction between elements in the light and elements in the shade.


Steve.
 
Some good reading in this thread. Thanks.

Having never stitched or blended images before, does anyone know if I can do it in aperture?
If not will something like StarStaX be any good? Or is this solely for star trails?
http://www.markus-enzweiler.de/software/software.html

Is the tamron considered good for landscapes? Or would a sigma 10-20mm produce better images?
 
For large impressively sharp prints derived from a single exposure (not stitched multiple exposure HDR thingimibobs), some significant advantages of film in 10"x8" View Cameras vs 35mm Digital include :

- large 10" x 8" negative (don't thing a sensor exists of this size yet)

- the ability to create and place the zone of acceptable focus in the most appropriate place to generate in-focus foreground and background (ie more creative options in-camera because more characteristics of the physics of optics are available to View Camera users)

- In addition to the creation of the 'In-Camera' image, analogue photography (negatives rather than positive/slides) has a further 3-stage process offering more artistic / creative (and non-sterile) opportunities for unique chemical / photon 'refinement' of the image at each stage
ie development of film (pushing / pulling and soup recipe), exposure of paper (analogue dodging, burning,....in the enlarger) and development processing of the paper print (eg standard, lith, ...)

That was how Ansel Adams did it - his career started 86 years ago so you don't need the latest technologies.

All you need is a bit of planning, foresight, determination, creativity, craftmanship, time and luck.
 
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markmullen said:
Funnily enough I've just produced my first image with a view camera, a Linhof Technikardan 23 although it was with a digital back rather than on film. Although it was a very slow job compared to medium format Dslr or 35mm dslr it was much more rewarding. I'm hoping to transition to using it as my main landscape camera.
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Welcome to the dark side Mark. Hope you knock out a few sheets though.
 
mrjames said:
I think it's time to step away from the DOF calculator and come back into the real world :p

as has been shown in the example posted above, find the diffraction limit of your lens and then focus stack.
I shoot a lot of macro, and shooting at f22 gives HORRIBLE results compared to shooting f5,6 and stacking.
I try to never shoot smaller than f8, I used to shoot landscapes at f22 and the results weren't pretty
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Does stacking mean that you go up or down stops and take multiple shots of the same image?
 
redddraggon said:
No you take multiple images changing the focus distance while keeping the same f/stop.
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Surely if your shooting at say f13 at the right distance into the shot the wholeimage will be in focus... ive never heard of any pros stacking other than for macro
 
barratt1988 said:
Surely if your shooting at say f13 at the right distance into the shot the wholeimage will be in focus... ive never heard of any pros stacking other than for macro
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It depends on how much DoF you've got, that depends on the size of the sensor, the focal length and the distance to your subject. With landscapes if you've got a foreground element very close to the lens, and distant mountains sometimes even f22 wouldn't be sufficient, which of course takes you into the realms of diffraction.

I have to be very careful shooting medium format digital to make sure I have enough DoF. I use the Scheimpflug principle with some tilt (either on a tilt shift lens, or on a view camera, depending on what I am using) to make the most of the DoF, that means I don't have to stop down as far and risk losing quality to diffraction, shooting closer to the optimum aperture of the lens.
 
I've said it before and I'll say it again.....it depends on the quality of the atmosphere.

You will never get "crisp" landscapes if the atmosphere is murky or hazy, no matter how good your technique.

You need to recognise the conditions which favour the landscape; for clarity often after the passage of a cold front, and often with a north-westerly airflow. High pressure systems are often the very worst times to photograph the landscape, even if it is 100% clear.
 
barratt1988 said:
ive never heard of any pros stacking other than for macro
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There's also moving objects to consider.

Say you have flowers blowing about in the wind that are 6 inches or so from you. Depending on the light you may choose to use a wide aperture to attain a fast shutter speed to 'freeze' the motion.

This would obviously result in a dof too shallow for the more distant elements of the scene which you might then photograph with a smaller aperture.
 
dinners said:
There's also moving objects to consider.

Say you have flowers blowing about in the wind that are 6 inches or so from you. Depending on the light you may choose to use a wide aperture to attain a fast shutter speed to 'freeze' the motion.

This would obviously result in a dof too shallow for the more distant elements of the scene which you might then photograph with a smaller aperture.
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Yes true but its a rarity to have that. And if thats the case you may very well be using a UWA lens. And sometimes the motion adds to the shot. The more you can do in camera the better for me.

As for the mountains comment states above youll struggle with the far background being sharp due to the issue of haze
 
dinners said:
There's also moving objects to consider.

Say you have flowers blowing about in the wind that are 6 inches or so from you. Depending on the light you may choose to use a wide aperture to attain a fast shutter speed to 'freeze' the motion.

This would obviously result in a dof too shallow for the more distant elements of the scene which you might then photograph with a smaller aperture.
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Which is when Scheimpflug / tilt is useful, you can shoot with a wide aperture whilst seemingly having lots of DoF. What you're actually doing is adjusting the plane of focus to follow the scene, rather than lots of it being wasted on the sky.
 
it's all about maximizing depth of field

running a sharpening filter in PS will also help but is not always required.
 
dinners said:
There's also moving objects to consider.

Say you have flowers blowing about in the wind that are 6 inches or so from you. Depending on the light you may choose to use a wide aperture to attain a fast shutter speed to 'freeze' the motion.

This would obviously result in a dof too shallow for the more distant elements of the scene which you might then photograph with a smaller aperture.
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barratt1988 said:
Yes true but its a rarity to have that. And if thats the case you may very well be using a UWA lens. And sometimes the motion adds to the shot. The more you can do in camera the better for me.

As for the mountains comment states above youll struggle with the far background being sharp due to the issue of haze
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markmullen said:
Which is when Scheimpflug / tilt is useful, you can shoot with a wide aperture whilst seemingly having lots of DoF. What you're actually doing is adjusting the plane of focus to follow the scene, rather than lots of it being wasted on the sky.
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I appreciate it's a rarity and motion may add to the shot - I was just giving an example of when some choose to go down that route.

I personally have never stacked a landscape image.
 
personally, for landscapes i shoot between f8 and f11, use hyperfocal distance charts and imo iso 200 is the optimal setting.
 
obviously use a tripod and remote trigger also, and use a shutter delay if possible :)
 
My d800 goes to 50 but I prefer iso 200. Just a personal preference that has worked for me. But you're correct. I guess it differs from body to body
 
Gavlar82 said:
My d800 goes to 50 but I prefer iso 200. Just a personal preference that has worked for me. But you're correct. I guess it differs from body to body
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Can you explain your reasoning? Not sayin you would notice and noise at 200 but surely 100 would be better? Cleaner? And 50... well its just noise reduction really so yer
 
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