Beneath the Mountains

I’ve shot this scene a number of times, trying different focal lengths from Ultra wide to telephoto. I have tried a few different angles as well, working to get the most out of the scene on the day. On this occasion I worked it a different way, putting my 50-140 lens on, and angling towards the mountains as the light faded overtop of them. Bringing just a sliver of the valley in to focus on those peaks. It creates an interesting scene on a mostly cloudless day. I played and tweaked with the photo until I felt it was done. It is easy to over edit at times, but its always fun to see what you can get out of a scene.

There’s nothing wrong with trying new compositions, working with the light you have available, using it to accentuate smaller parts of the greater whole. The entire vista here is actually an entire community you can see from the lookout. Roads, houses, businesses, and stretches on as far as the eye can see. The trick with landscape photography is sometimes knowing when to pull back, divert from the easy composition and leaning into those more intimate scenes. I could of easily only included the mountains here, but I thought the fields bellow would offer some context to the overall scene.

That’s where it begins to get difficult. What do you include? What do you remove? Every photographer struggles with these decisions on occasion. Do the mountains on their own tell enough story, or do you need a supporting cast? The mountains alone would seem fine, but then you realize there’s no scale or context outside of “Another Landscape Photo”. Adding small sections of fields and town in gives the viewer an idea of the scale and depth of the scene. It tells them a story. I shot this image a while back, but needed to work on it longer than some others so I could get a more precise feel for the scene before I shared.

Until Next Time!

Aperture: f8
ISO: 800
SS: 1/80th
Focal: 56mm

Fujinon 50-140mm