Think landscape photography and wide-angle lenses come to mindthe wider the better. To some photographers, a 28mm lens in 35mm format or a 50mm lens for medium format is thought of as not wide enough for real landscape work. Is this correct? Does landscape need such wide lenses? And, what can you do with a telephoto lens?
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Murroogh Beach, Fanore, County of Clare, Ireland, August 2002, late in the evening. Bronica EC-TL, 50 2.8 Zenzanon, 1 sec @ 22, Fuji Provia 100F
This article covers the use of different focal lengths in landscape photography. It certainly is not about 24mm vs. 28mm. Or, do I need a 200 2.8? It is about wide-angle and telephoto and their relative merits as well as area composition and rhythm composition. By the way: just use the gear you already own and only start thinking about new stuff if your older gear really gets in the way of your work and vision.
Wide-Angle
Most landscapes stretch into a certain width. This is especially obvious at sea or in the Dutch polders, but mountain scenery and vistas are strikingly wide as well ("God created the world except Holland. It was taken by its inhabitants from the sea." This expression indicates why Dutch polder landscapes are so special to people from abroad, though the Dutch don't seem particularly thrilled.) A wide-angle lens helps to catch the natural expanse of these special scenes.
How does this work? First, a large section of the horizon is shown in the photograph, which helps give a sense of great width. Second, a large part of the foreground is included as well, and that foreground can look noticeably exaggerated by the wide-angle perspective, even to the point that you feel like you are falling forward. This results from the fact that even the ground just in front of the photographer's feet is in the image. Third, the combinationation of these elements causes the relation between near and far to be stretched and distorted. Used consciously, this effect gives an enormous depth to landscape photos.
Murroogh Beach, Fanore, County of Clare, Ireland, July 2002, in the morning. Bronica EC-TL, 50 2.8 Zenzanon, 1/15 sec @ 22, Fuji Provia 100F
But does such a wide-angle shot of that beautiful wide scene always deliver a stunning photograph? Does the photograph breath the same space as that super vista?
A Dutch author on photography, Dick Boer, often called the wide-angle lens "a greedy lens". It includes a lot in the photograph and it is the photographer's troublesome task to find such a point of view and composition, that only significant parts get into the picture. All too often the foreground is not that interesting or distance details, making the landscape a fascinating place, are hardly visible.
A less successful wide-angle image:
Castle Tioram, Moidart, Highlands, Scotland, July 1999, in the morning. Bronica EC-TL, 50 2.8 Zenzanon, about 1/4 sec @ 16, Fuji Provia 100
The wide-angle is used at its best, if the foreground is included prominently in the composition. I like to put a typical element of the landscape, like a piece of rock or a flowering heather shrub, on a marked place within the image. The horizon is placed high in these cases. Alternatively, an impressive sky, vaulting all over the landscape, often needs a wide-angle as well. The horizon can be quite low in this case as the sky is the real subject.
Telephoto Lens
The telephoto lens has the reversed characteristics. All elements of the landscape are pushed against each other, so to speak, and the image suggests distance rather than width as the perspective is compressed. This effect can be used to great advantage for mountains, islands, avenues, etc. It suggests that one summit is very close to the next one or that an avenue is fully packed with trees.
Because the telephoto lens brings the distance nearer, the atmospheric perspective is far more obvious than in a wide-angle photograph. All kinds of dust and vapor in the air render the distance more vague. Especially fog and haze transform a landscape into a children's viewing box, where each next "cut out layer" is painted in more dimmed hues.
Farmland and Forest, Gelderse Vallei, the Netherlands, June 1998, early morning. Bronica EC-TL, 150 3.5 Zenzanon, about 1/4 sec @ 16, Fuji Provia 100
This atmospheric perspective makes the telephoto shot look monochromatic. The various elements of the landscape no longer show their own color, but take on the color of the available light. Depending on time and weather the entire picture can look yellow, purple, blue and so on. Because of this the telephoto lens is very good in rendering the atmosphere of a certain time of the day. And, as the foreground is not included, the number of image elements can be limited. Appropriate use of this feature stresses the atmosphere. In other words: telephoto shots tend to be more intimate. One looks, as it were, through a window and sees fewer elements.
View on Connemara from Craggagh, County of Clare, Ireland, August 2002, in the evening. Bronica EC-TL, 25cm 4.0 Nikkor and 2x converter, about 1/15 sec @ 8, Fuji Provia 100F
Another difference between wide-angle and telephoto is in depth-of-field. The telephoto lens has a more limited depth-of-field, although a small aperture and more distance to the subject help to make an image sharp from front to back. But that limited depth-of-field can be used to your advantage as well. Not only for portraits or macro, but also for landscape as well. To me, landscape is not only the large scenes and panoramas. I like to include "portraits" of the main characters of a certain landscape as well: trees, rocks, flowers.
Field Flowers, Roundstone, County of Galway, Ireland, August 2002, in the morning. Bronica EC-TL, 25cm 4.0 Nikkor, about 1/30 sec @ 11, Fuji Provia 100F
And yes, a telephoto can be necessary as soon as you can't get close enough to the subject. The real wildlife geek carries all those heavy lenses for a reason - not because of that fabulous shot of the branch where a moment ago that stunning little bird still was singing!
As you may have noticed, I didn't discuss the standard lens here, but not because I never use it. It can be the perfect lens for a given situation: neither too wide nor too compressed. It works especially well for trees and houses, which seem to fall down backwards with a wide-angle and where a telephoto doesn't allow a free view.
Area Composition
Some images are visually strong because of the way areas within the image are divided up. The image as a whole is more like a kind of flag or map: it is made of areas that balance each other. Hint: I try to keep bright areas small, because they attract more attention than darker areas.
Cottage, Kilchoan, Ardnamurchan, Highlands, Scotland, July 1999, around noon. Bronica EC-TL, 80 2.4 Zenzanon, 1/60 sec @ 11-16, Fuji Provia 100
These kinds of images are often made by a telephoto. Because most of the time the foreground is not included, the number of elements is restricted. And, the fewer areas a composition has, the stronger the whole of the image.
Rhythm Composition
Sometimes, it isn't so much areas making a composition, but a certain rhythm of linear elements. This can coincide with a strong feeling of depth, like in an avenue of trees. It can also render a total lack of depth, like in a frontal shot of a fence or a row of trees. Again, the telephoto has its use. Because it compresses perspective, the various elements are nearer to each other and the rhythm is made stronger. An impressive tree avenue can be shot with a telephoto rather than a wide-angle, because a wide-angle breaks the nearest trees out of the line.
Like the shot below shows, the telephoto also offers the possibility to isolate a detail out of a larger scene. This way the rhythm can make up for the entire composition.
Pine Wood, Amerongse Berg, the Netherlands, February 2003, in the afternoon. Rollei 6008i, 150 4.0 Sonnar, about 1/15 sec @ 16, Kodak E100SW
This composition has no depththe eyes don't follow a route. But, because of the rhythm the image is attractive in its own right.
Author and Photographer Wim van Velzen
Originally published March 2003 http://www.fotografiewimvanvelzen.nl/webarticle04.htm
Edited and republished with permission of Wim van Velzen and Photo Composition Library.