Blog - Landscape

In the previous article in this series, I talked about the equipment one might use for aerial photography. So what about technique, and especially camera settings? What should you consider when shooting from the air?  The important thing to remember here is that you’re shooting from a moving, vibrating aircraft instead of from stable ground. This simply means that in order to keep your shots sharp, you’ll need to use a high shutter speed. Remember that the...

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In previous articles I've discussed the advantages of aerial photography and shooting from a helicopter as opposed to shooting from a light plane. But are there any special considerations with regard to equipment when shooting from the air? Since we’ve already established that it’s the superior choice (at least in my opinion), let’s concentrate on the helicopter first. An open door gives the photographer a vast range of angle options, and...

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In the previous article I talked about some of the advantages of aerial photography. But how does one do it in the real world? Let’s start with the aircraft. There are two main options here: a light airplane or a helicopter. Yes, you can shoot from a hot air balloon but it’s not really an option in most places, plus it’s far less maneuverable, so I’ll gently disregard it. Also, while drones are taking the world of aerial photography by storm, the...

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Man has always had the dream of flight – but so has the photographer. It’s a unique experience to shoot from the air, and it has some incredible benefits in many senses. But as one might discover, it often carries a number of problems and a hefty price tag. I personally started my romance with serious aerial photography about three years ago, and I’ve been hooked ever since. My experiences have mostly been amazing but admittedly not always so, and I’ve come to...

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Hell on earth. It sounds like hyperbole, but the Danakil Depression is exactly that. In late 2013 I spent 1.5 months traveling extensively in Ethiopia, and I visited the Danakil to scout locations for my 'Earth, Wind and Fire' workshop. It is, by my own experience, one of the most inhospitable environments you can actually visit. Scorching heat, no roads, no running water, not to mention hotels or any other modern convenience. But it is exactly these qualities which make...

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In this article I'll tell about the interesting process of producing my image 'Crystalline'. I shot it during January 2014, and processed it at the time, but lately the addition of new Photoshop features lead me to revisit it, and reprocess it in a different way. This image is an HDR-Panorama, a kind of shot which is usually technically difficult to produce, but as I show below, this difficulty is now relegated to the past. I hope you find the explanation interesting and...

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How many times should one take a shot of a place or a landmark until it’s too much? When do you think one should just let go? After Ten shots? A hundred? Never? I think a good approach to this might be to shoot it until you’ve got something that stands out from your own images of the place. If you keep getting the same standard of shots from somewhere, you’re not quite there yet and you need to keep shooting it. Once you get something that’s truly special and very...

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Part of what can make an image both visually appealing and conceptually interesting is the connection between its different parts. An image is a whole made of differentiable elements, and these elements can either be separate or have a variety of relations between them. To make an image which is indeed a whole and not just different layers on top of each other, a photographer needs to make the layers (or elements) communicate with each other. But how? One way, of which I will write here, is...

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This time I’ll talk about a subject which might be less inherently connected to landscape photography, but as I see it, it’s very relevant to this field as it is to other kinds of photography, and through it one can have a larger appreciation for our craft and a stronger connection to one’s own art. Naming a piece of art has always been important, not only to have a way to refer to the piece, but also, and much more importantly, to present a window to the creator’s...

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In this article I'll take you to a grisly scene I encountered, which enabled me to produce quite a rare shot. This image is special to me for two reasons: first of all, it's a very unique image, telling a story you don't come across very often. Secondly, I've had to put in work I usually don't do when it comes to post-processing, to make it look right. All in all, I'm happy with the result, and it has won good acclaim in international competitions and publications. The...

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