​Some practical tips for travel photography

Photographing a landscape is actually photographing light, canvas prints and good light can make a landscape extraordinary. For close shots of scenery or forests or waterfalls, it's better to take a cloudy day. If you want to get serious, you're better off shooting at dawn or dusk. This is because the sun is low on the horizon in the early morning and dusk, providing nature with the best light and illumination. Of course, the scenery can also use expressive light, such as the clear sky after a storm, and if it happens in the morning or dusk, the light will be more expressive. So the opportunity to photograph scenery is at dawn, early morning, dusk and sunset, and you should try your best to seize the opportunity to capture unforgettable scenes.

Choose the right time

Although the scenery is always there, you don't have the opportunity to visit it constantly, canvas prints online in all kinds of light conditions and even in different seasons. Therefore, it is important to know where the sun rises and sets, so that you can determine the direction of the light. Remember, the sun rises and sets at different times of the year. While there aren't many technical difficulties involved in shooting landscapes, it takes time and effort to excel and transcend mediocrity.

If you're on location for the first time, be sure to figure out where the sun is moving and consider the whole scene. Visualize what your photos will look like before you take them out. big canvas prints If your perspective is fixed, try to find a less familiar one. If you want to capture the whole scene with a wide Angle lens, find an interesting foreground to add depth to the picture. Boulders, crooked trees and grazing cows can be useful prospects. In addition, we can also try to adopt the abstract processing mode, and choose the image elements with visual impact in the landscape.

Selective focusing

Grasp the relationship between the foreground and the horizon by using the depth of field. Focus selectively. By using a wide aperture such as F /2.8, you can focus both the foreground and the background out of focus and focus on the details of the landscape you want to highlight. These out-of-focus images can be used as part of the picture composition.

Creative ambiguity

Try a lower shutter speed, usually a quarter of a second or less, to create a dramatic effect, such as a fuzzy branch swaying in the wind or a misty stream. Since other objects are static, this blurring adds a pleasant dynamic effect. A longer exposure, say a few minutes, creates a pleasing dynamic effect, such as a misty cloud or foggy sea.

If the light is too strong, use a low shutter speed to get a blur effect, and use a polarizer or a medium gray filter to reduce the amount of light. The image above was taken at a lower shutter speed.

Focus on composition

Remember that the law of landscape photography is "less is more". The more concise the picture, the better. You don't have to include too many objects. Using a telephoto lens can help you highlight a particular scene. By using a telephoto lens for remote shooting, the perspective can be compressed, making distant scenes more prominent than near scenes.

In addition, the use of a low-view wide-angle lens can make the viewer feel as if they are in the scene, creating a fresh perspective on the landscape. In the shooting, you must be good at using the photography technique, expand the imagination, and turn ordinary into magic. Consider placing someone in the picture to create a sense of space and proportion in the landscape. This is especially useful when you want to present a large scene, or when there are mountains or dunes in the scene. If you're alone, use the selfie feature, prop up the camera with a tripod, and set the right exposure combination in advance, or auto exposure if the light changes. You can take seconds to walk into the camera, pose, and brew a good expression. If you're using a digital camera, you can see on the screen if you're in position.

Subtle exposure

When traveling, photographers often encounter shooting environments they are not used to. Different from other scenery scenes, if you are on the beach at noon, when the sun is big and the shadows are short, it is very suitable for photographing the beach. If there are no footprints on the beach, it will be more primitive and plain. In the middle of the day, many people take a cool break in the shade and the beach is empty, which is more conducive to shooting a profound and open scene. However, the beach is highly reflective, which can fool the camera's light meter and cause underexposure. Maybe you should increase the exposure by half a level, or by a full level when shooting snow scenes (otherwise the snow will be a dirty grey, not the pure white you expect). To get the right exposure, you can try a mid-tone photometry, for example, based on boulders on the beach. This is where the point metering feature on your camera comes in handy.

Ii. Landmarks and perspectives

Famous landmarks, such as the Eiffel Tower and the pyramids, have become a great challenge for photographers. The images we take are so familiar that they can become commonplace. So, how do you inject life and interest into familiar landscapes without creating postcard-like landscapes?

Unique perspective

A unique perspective, good shooting time and a bit of imagination are all necessary factors to create a good picture. When you arrive at a scenic spot and have seen the view, look around for a unique perspective to represent the view. One way is to climb up and look down. I once climbed on the scaffolding of a building to get a better view. You can also shoot with a wide-angle lens. You don't have to worry about distorting the building with a wide-angle lens. After all, you're not an architectural photographer. You can also lower yourself so that you don't get dirty. You can lay on the ground and photograph birds, flowers, trees and other interesting foregrounds, all of which can blur out the focus and give the picture depth and originality. You can walk around the site and sometimes a nearby roof or background will give you a different perspective. Few people who have been to the Taj Mahal have ever been to the back of this great building, where you will find a river, and if you view from the opposite side of the river in the morning mist, you will get an extraordinary and unique view of the landscape.

Choose the time to shoot

The timing of the shoot can often determine the success of your creation. The morning provides excellent light: low angles, warm tones, long projections. With fewer visitors, there are more shooting opportunities. Another good shooting time is at dusk, when the scenic buildings are bathed in the sunset glow, but the sky is still rosy and colorful before it is completely black. If possible, you can check out the lights beforehand. In general, famous landmarks get good light. Many famous buildings have websites. Therefore, before visiting the buildings in the field, make a virtual visit on the Internet to learn key information, such as opening hours, arrival routes and periods of full daylight.

Night shooting

If you want to make your travel photos more colorful, night shots are a good choice. The night scene of the city is particularly vivid. The street scene looks dull and dull by day, but at night it is full of brilliant lights. Cities such as Las Vegas, Tokyo and Shanghai are neon lights at night. Some famous buildings, such as London's Tower Bridge or the Colosseum, are certainly brightly lit at night, presenting a new scene.

The light source

There is a wide variety of light sources in the city at night. Some buildings use warm iodine tungsten lamps, while others use cold green fluorescent lamps. These light sources can create a surreal and fun atmosphere, and fluorescent lighting can sometimes be lack-alive. You can use a red filter to correct your shot, or Photoshop to correct it in post-production.

The tripod

The most important piece of equipment for night shots is a tripod. Night shots typically require an exposure time of 10 to 60 seconds, which is a long time for no one to hold the camera steady. The key to handheld cameras is that the shutter speed should not exceed the reciprocal of the focal length of the lens in use. Therefore, with a 50mm lens, the shutter speed should not be less than 1/60 of a second. You need to use a lower shutter speed when you use a long exposure. You should look up information about the film you are using. When you use a shutter speed of more than 10 seconds, you should add a half - stage exposure compensation.

Use flash

One of the most common misconceptions about night photography is that an ordinary flash can illuminate a distant scene. In fact, the maximum power of a random flash can only illuminate a scene at a distance of 10 meters. Flash techniques can be useful, such as combining ambient light with a flash, to help freeze a part of a scene.

The most basic flash technique is supplementary flash, which has been described earlier. This is the default setting for most flash systems. When the camera's exposure system detects severe shadows or insufficient ambient light, the flash will complement the light. General exposure systems can measure accurate values, but you may need to make some negative exposure compensation to create a finer effect.

Some cameras have a feature called rear curtain syncing: the flash flashes at the end of the exposure, rather than at the beginning. This allows a moving object to create a light bar that appears to follow the moving object, making the motion appear more natural. Also consider the use of flash during long exposures for night shots.

Digital photography in low light conditions

One obvious advantage of digital night photography is the ability to capture detailed images of the sky, even late at night. The night sky on film might be a dull mass of darkness, but the super sensitive nature of the digital sensors allows you to capture the color of the night sky without overexposing everything else. Another advantage is that digital photography can see the picture immediately, so you can check for glare, how the car's light bars look, how blurry they are, beach prints on canvas and so on. However, high iso and slow shutter speeds can cause annoying noise. Try out your camera to see what kind of sensitivity setting works best.