A polarizing filter is one of the most essential tools in a landscape photographer’s bag. It is typically the first filter landscape photographers buy to instantly improve their pictures by adding vividness and contrast to them. In this article, we will go through detailed information on polarizing filters, what they do, why they are important and why you should consider using them for your landscape photography.
How to Use the Radial Filter in Lightroom (Video)
Have you ever wondered how to use the radial filter in Lightroom? Although we have covered it in depth in our Workflow and Post-Processing course, I thought it would be a good idea to share some detail about the specifics of the radial filter in a video. If you are just starting out in Lightroom, this will be a good introduction on how to use the radial filter, which keyboard shortcuts to use to access it and how to do basic customizations to make the tool fit your needs.
Announcing 2017 PL Workshops!
We are once again excited to announce our upcoming workshops later this year and this time we have a few surprises! In addition to the regularly conducted Colorado Fall Colors Workshops, we are adding two more workshops – Jordan Photography Workshop and Death Valley National Park Workshop! Please read below for the full schedule of these workshops and if you would like to participate, please sign up sooner than later, since they fill up pretty quickly.
Exploring Namibia – Etosha National Park
As the wheels of the land rover cracked across the dry crust of the Namibian soil I gazed across the plains ahead. It was July in Namibia and the dry season was in full swing. Arriving from the lush Zambezi river my thoughts were filled with the verdant wetland smell of damp bush and water reeds, Etosha, as I was to discover, is an altogether different beast. Approaching the centrepiece of the park one sees a vast salt pan surrounded by grasslands covered in bone-white sand. The closer you come to the centre the farther you can see on all sides, beyond the painted pale shrubbery into the smoky veil of the veld. Etosha does not rise before you, it expands.
ISO Invariance Explained
ISO invariance is one of the most talked-about topics in photography today, yet most people don’t really understand what it is. That isn’t a surprise; ISO invariance can be very technical and counter-intuitive, and it doesn’t fit well with many photographers’ general understanding of ISO. However, ISO invariance is an important topic, especially since many cameras today are close to being ISO invariant. If you want to maximize your camera’s dynamic range and avoid using “useless” ISO values, this topic is directly relevant to your photos. So, what is ISO invariance, and how can you use it to your advantage in your own photography?
Photographing Iceland Using Ultra Wide-Angle Lenses
It is no secret that I love using ultra wide-angle lenses for my landscape photography. I was especially excited when I received the new Sigma 12-24mm f/4 DG HSM Art lens just before I departed for my winter Iceland workshop. It has an amazing 122-degree angle of view at 12mm. Many photographers have a difficult time using ultra wide-angle lenses correctly when composing a scene. Why? The simple answer is that they do not get close enough to their subject.
JPEGmini Server Review
Review Rating:
After I had a chance to test and review the JPEGmini Pro software, I realized how powerful this software is not just for exporting images and being part of a Lightroom workflow, but also for many other uses, including optimizing images that are already sitting on our large storage devices. Another use I immediately thought of, was the web server where Photography Life traffic originates from. Given how much traffic PL serves worldwide on a day-to-day basis and the fact that images alone account for roughly 5 Terabytes of traffic per month, the thought of being able to compress JPEG images using the JPEGmini engine was something that I really wanted to implement sooner than later. So I embarked on a new project – to save both traffic and money in the long run for PL, using the JPEGmini server.
Photographers Beware: this is a very technical review of software that is not related to photography. I decided to publish the review at PL, since I feel that other photography-heavy websites could hugely benefit from implementing the JPEGmini server.
Camera Color Calibration Explained
Two recurring questions that we often see from photographers are: “I have color management properly set up on my computer; why is it that the color is different between an out-of-camera JPEG and, say, Lightroom (substitute with your favorite 3rd-party converter)?” and “Why is it that the particular color on a photo is different from the actual color?”. In this article, we will go over why color from images is reproduced differently on camera LCD screens and monitors, and the steps you can take to achieve more accurate colors.
My Complicated Relationship with Seascapes
I have a confession: I have a love/hate relationship with seascapes. Sometimes I feel like they are easy, monotonous and a little bit of a sham — an easy way to impress others without having to put in the requisite amount of work. On such days I vow never to shoot a seascape again. And then there are moments when I cannot resist the pull of the ocean. When the sky looks like it will go up in flames at sunset casting it’s glow on everything the light touches — the sand, the rocks, the water. When the tide is high and the waves crashing violently into the surf promise dramatic foregrounds. ‘This will be my greatest seascape,’ I tell myself as I pick up my gear and head for the beach, bracing for the challenge ahead.
A Study in Light, Directionality and Mood
In the first of a series of follow-up articles to The Quality of Light, I have posted this article to share a series of photographs (along with the thought processes behind them) that I hope will accentuate the interplay of light, directionality, shadows, and mood in landscape photography. As previously discussed, the directionality of light is a powerful factor in defining the quality of shadows, the contrast, textures, and three-dimensionality of a scene, as well as the mood and emotion that the photograph will convey. In particular, unidirectional light qualities (e.g., side lighting and backlighting) serve this purpose well in landscape photography.