Photographing Mountains
1. Vast expanses do not lead to great photographs.
2. Plan, use google maps, osi maps, sunrise and sunset
directions and various apps on your phone to plan your
photography excursion.
3. Use ND graduated filters.
4. Use a telephoto lens to isolate shapes, layers and textures in a scene,
if using a telephoto lens then go for a (square) 1:1 or 4:3 crop.
5. Pack a light carbon fiber tripod, your going to be walking a lot
and don't want to be lumbered with a heavy pack, because carbon
fiber tripods are lighter they tend to be less sturdy they're affected by
vibration so use a cable release or the timer function on your camera.
6. Shed some gear, only bring one maybe two lenses to conserve
weight.
7. Find something unique about that particular mountain, fog,
mist, river, lake, rock or stone formations.
8. Combinations, combine the mountain with other features, lakes
or rivers.
9. Take your time, take time to enjoy the view before even setting your up tripod and
camera.
10. Include people as foreground detail for greater social media
impact, do not treat this as a portrait photograph more of
a candid shot i.e. a person looking out into the distance, a
person crossing a river, a person silhouetted at sunset.
11. Take your time, enjoy the scene, consider all the best angles
to shoot the scene from, high, low or side angles.
12. Tight for time, racing to catch the last embers of the dying
sunset then think quick - look for a focal point, look for lead
in lines to that focal point, use rule of thirds. If you have little
more time then anticipated then break the rules and get
creative.
13. Safety, always tell someone where you are going, the route you will take and what
time you are due to return.
14. Food and water are a must, it's hard to be creative when you stomach is grumbling.
15. Good clothing, warm and waterproof, good warm hiking boot that are good on wet
surfaces, you don't want to slide on rocks or wet grass spraining an ankle.
16. A hand held GPS tracker and a compass if you are planning to go off track.
17. A whistle for attracting attention in case of injury's, the international distress call
with a whistle is 6 blasts with a minute between each blast, when you get a
response blow 3 long blasts and no matter what happens do not stop blowing
until your rescuer is beside you.