Landscape Photography

Professional landscape photography has little to do with the romantic idea of travelling throughout the world, unpacking your camera in the most beautiful places and then starting to take photographs. Also, being in natural surroundings a lot of the time and travelling still do not guarantee by a long shot that you will get impressive pictures. Being “in the right place at the right time” is often associated with great expense and not feasible without careful planning.

The “right time”? When is that? We must just keep in mind that at any time, at any second, somewhere in the world, definitely even in many places at the same time, Nature reveals itself in all its glory. And I would like to share as many of these moments as possible and to capture as many as possible with my camera.

Good planning precedes a trip to a region regardless of whether it is a continent, a country, a mountain range or only a small lake. On the one hand, there are pictures which I see in collections of photographs on the internet or in advertisements and which appeal to me. On the other hand, I always like to study maps and to imagine the landscape represented by them. Then, I have to go there and see it with my own eyes. I would like to turn it into my own memory and to experience and capture this magical place in my own way.

Where are these mountains? Where are there rivers, lakes and gorges? Where does the sun rise? Where does it set? Where should I be in the early morning? Where should I be in the evening? How high is the altitude and in what amount of time is it to be climbed? When are low and high tide? When is there a full moon?… If all of these questions have been answered and I have a rough plan and have defined my goals, then I can take it from there.

Then, it’s a case of drowsily rising long before sunrise and of staggering to a planned destination or one that was viewed on the previous day already. And in the evening, you continue until dark or, if there is moonlight, even into the night. Then you stand next to your camera for an hour, hungry and alone with wet feet at a temperature of 5°C in the middle of nowhere, hold a shield in your hand to deflect the wind and think to yourself “Why on earth am I doing this to myself?” However, later, at home on the computer you are then rewarded with photographs which make your heart beat faster.

Of course, you can only increase the chances of a good picture and/or improve the yield of a trip by good planning. However, these unanticipated impressions and those pictures for which you didn’t bargain must not be forgotten. For me, these pictures give this activity a very special allure.