Landscape Photography for Beginners: Shoot Stunning Images

An introduction to the type of photography equipment you need to capture stunning landscapes, from the basics, intermediate and more advanced levels.

Understand what camera you need to capture landscape and nature images.

With so many modern cameras, we uncover what is best for your landscape photography. Micro-four thirds vs APS-C or Full frame cameras?

An overview of the different lenses out there and understanding what lenses would be best for your type of photography requirements.

There is a great debate about what is pro vs budget lens is and whether the price tag gives us that advantage we strive for.

Understand the differences between prime and zoom lenses for landscape photography and how much we should spend on lenses.

Are tripods really that important to photography? Do we need one, what should we look for and how much should be invest?

With so many filters on the market, from circular to drop-in and slide-in filters, this is a basic understanding of the filter range and if they are necessary for your photography.

Oversee all the accessories I recommend to make your photography easier with beginner, intermediate and more advanced accessories to make your life easier in the field.

Start understanding the basics of what we require to understand in-camera for capturing outdoor nature images.

Begin to understand 1 of the 3 main elements in photography - ISO

Learn how ISO affects your images in the field with this practical lesson!

Learn how ISO affects your images in low light and night photography in the field with this practical lesson!

Begin to understand the 2 of 3 main elements in photography - Shutter Speed.

Learn how Shutter Speed affects your landscape images with this practical lesson!

Learn how Shutter Speed affects your images with moving objects, or motion, in this scenario a waterfall, in this practical lesson!

Begin to understand the 3rd of 3 main elements in photography - The aperture.

Learn in the field how Aperture affects your photography and the best aperture to use in each instance with this practical lesson!

Understand the difference between aperture and the impact it has in low light in the field with this practical lesson!

Now we understand the 3 basics of photography ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture we can begin to understand how they operate in connection with one another.

Although the exposure triangle may be a little difficult, shooting in aperture priority, mode will make out photography life easier and achieve the best results.

Progressively we are starting to understand more information we require to capture stunning photos in the advanced basics module.

One of the most important lessons is understanding ALL the information our camera gives us regarding the data from the image.

A lesson giving a pro tip to make your post-production life easier, expose to the right of the histogram to capture all the useable data we require in our image.

With three main metering modes in modern cameras, what do we select for each situation we encounter in our photography?

In this lesson, we learn to manually override our camera's automatic settings by reading the histogram and exposing it to the right with exposure compensation.

Should I shoot in RAW or JPEG? In this lesson, we determine what format you should be shooting in.

Understand the POWER of RAW image, especially in image processing which we will find out in the last lesson in this course!

Regardless of brand or sensor size, every modern camera has a different dynamic range that can impact the result. In this lesson, we learn how to test the dynamic range of your camera.

Adjusting white balance or Kelvin Temperature in-camera, is it really that important?

One of the most crucial aspects of photography is focusing. Generally, everything in post-production can save or improve our image. However, an out-of-focus image can never be recovered. In this module, we cover the importance of focusing and how to obtain the best results.

There are two ways of focusing on landscape photography. This lesson compares hyperfocal distance, a scientifically calculated method, versus a manual single-point focus on a subject.

As discussed in the previous module, we understand the importance of the Aperture regarding the depth of field in our photography. Aperture also impacts our focusing point and understanding of what will and will not be in focus.

Although this lesson may discuss some advanced technical aspects of focusing, it's important that throughout this course, we understand the correlation between aperture, focusing points and the focal range we use to capture our image.

In this lesson, we head out in the field to understand focusing with a wide-angle lens and some key takeaways we need to know when capturing wide-angle photography.

In this lesson, we head out in the field again to understand focusing, only using a telephoto lens this time. We need to remember some critical factors when capturing telephoto images, as we discuss in this lesson.

As our photography evolves, you will see and read about many accessories to improve your photography. No doubt you will come across the benefits of a polarising filter. In this lesson, we discuss what a polarise is.

Now we understand what a polariser is, we head out in the field to a waterfall to understand the benefits of this marvellous filter visually.

A polariser has multiple benefits. In this lesson, we look at how it can reduce and cut through haze in the atmosphere to improve our landscape images in clarity and make them more vivid.

A neutral Density filter can achieve an impressive result with moving objects in the scene. We photograph a flowing river to experiment with our results.

Although filters can create fantastic and unique results, there are some negatives when capturing landscape images with additional glass on the front of our lenses called a colour cast. This lesson explains what those negative results are.

Exposure in landscape photography is an element of photography many beginners can become confused by when first starting. In this module, we will discuss the fundamentals of exposing correctly.

Previously, we discussed the importance of understanding and exposing the histogram to the right. In this lesson, we photograph a scene that perfectly explains the 'expose to the right' technique and understand our camera's dynamic range limitation.

Exposure in photography correlates directly to light, natural or artificial. This lesson discusses the importance and impact light can make in our photography.

Once we understand the fundamentals of photography and how our camera operates, two main aspects drastically improve our photography, composition and finding the correct light.

High-contrast scenes (sunrise & sunset) are what landscape photographers dream of capturing.  This lesson covers some critical fundamentals for capturing dramatic sunset images.

In lesson 2 of this module, we discussed dynamic range in the field and trying to capture everything within the correct exposure, from highlights to shadows. In some situations, we are unable to do this. Exposure bracketing is an advanced learning technique that will improve your photography results.

Understand how the vital composition is to generate unique and personal images for landscape & nature photography.

Composition in photography comes down to personal taste, but with this, in mind, there are key elements we have to abide by to achieve the best results.

The rule of thirds is a very simple and easy-to-understand rule but a crucial element for compositions in all types of photography.

Following the rule of thirds, we now advance our composition elements by adding a subject to the scene.

Creating leading lines in your landscape images is a simple but powerful composition aspect. Now we understand the rule of thirds. We can incorporate them all together to enhance our composition skills.

Another composition element is very similar to leading lines. However, rather than going straight into the image, we are now photographing with more angles and aspects in the image.

The most advanced leading lines composition elements create the most impact through depth and scale in your composition. Often harder to develop and incorporate into the rules of thirds 's' and 'z' curves.

Landscape photography often has a wide-angle element incorporated into capturing the entire vista. Additionally, all the composition aspects covered previously can differ when using numerous focal ranges, and the rules in conjunction may affect the desired outcome.

Just like focal ranges, how we frame the subject through the rules of thirds will significantly impact the outcome of our image.

Rules are made to be broken, which is undoubtedly when capturing reflection photography. Understand how all the composition rules get thrown out the door and learn how to create simple but stunning reflection photography.

Learn from an out-in-the-field practical lesson learning wide-angle compositions.

Learn from an out-in-the-field practical lesson learning telephoto compositions.

When shooting wide-angle photography, focusing on a foreground element doesn't allow everything to be in focus from the foreground to the background. Previously in this course, we discussed aperture + focus point. This will help us understand the correlation between the two.

A more advanced composition technique of panoramic photography and the must-know aspects of capturing a vast panorama.

Purists of landscape photography may have different opinions on creating scale in our landscape images. However, great ways exist to tell a story and simultaneously generate scale.

Minimal and straightforward landscapes can often be hard to see, but when done correctly, this composition element can stand above the rest!

If you stuck for a composition idea at a picture-perfect location? Here is something that can help!

Download the RAW Files - A guide to image editing that we will cover in this course's last module. Understand how image editing will give us the BEST results from our images.

Understand the essential editing tools of Adobe Lightroom and how they will incorporate into our workflow.

Global adjustments, what should you do to the overall image to get the best quality out of your pictures?

Get the best results by fine-tuning your image and understanding the power of local adjustments.

In this lesson, we will finally understand why in module 4 of this course, we learnt how to expose to the right. Trust me. It will make our post-production life so much easier.

Are you having trouble exposing the sky correctly even though you are exposed to the right out in the field? This simple lightroom trick will enhance your image without damaging the end result.

A lesson edited an entire image from a recent class that we captured in the field.

We learnt how to focus stack in the field, but how do we get the desired result? Let's learn!

In this course, we understood the power of filters and how we can only achieve these results in the field. Now let's learn how to counteract the negatives of using filters.

Thanks to Adobe Lightroom doing all the work, Panoramic photography has never been easy to create breathtaking images.