Favorite Focal Length For Landscapes

[chris00nj]

My plans to go on holiday to Alaska this year will give me the opportunity to take a lot of landscape photos. Planning in my head, I've been trying to decide which focal length I'd need or use the most.

At first I thought that I'd use a super-wide the most, but then I thought that this may include too much of the foreground.... so then I might use something like a 35mm more.

Any thoughts?

 

[navilluspm]

A 35 and an 85 is a good combination. (But I prefer 28/85 and a 50 to tag along in case I need the extra stop of speed in shaded areas).

 

[uhligfd]

Focal length per se is not meaningful unless you give your film/sensor size, too.

This is so because it is the actual angle of view when looking out of the taking lens that you are wondering about, is it not?

35mm in LF would be spectacularly wide, while 35 mm on a small sensor P+S is like a tele lens on 35mm film.

For landscapes (with or without foreground), each angle of view has its own advantages and disadvantages. You might want a long tele type lens shot of a foggy mountain range on the horizon, or a 100 degree wide one of the vast landscape.

If you have never owned a wide angle of view lens, it may not be feasible to learn how to master one on a trip into unfamiliar territory.

Or it may give your work a new meaning and direction.

So: what angle of view are you talking about?
And NOT: WHAT FOCAL LENGTH, please.

 

[ChrisN]

Just a suggestion, but have a look at other people's landscapes you like, and check what focal lengths they're using. (Just checked Flickr, and found roughly 16,600 photos with a search for "landscape alaska".)

For a trip like that, I'd like to have a selection of lenses between 10mm and 200mm for the Pentax DSLR (1.5 crop factor), and a 35mm for the M4 rangefinder.

 

[Sonnar2]

depends on. 15mm, 25mm, 35mm, 50mm, 75, 85 or 90mm, 135mm.

 

[chris00nj]

Focal length per se is not meaningful unless you give your film/sensor size, too.

This is so because it is the actual angle of view when looking out of the taking lens that you are wondering about, is it not?

35mm in LF would be spectacularly wide, while 35 mm on a small sensor P+S is like a tele lens on 35mm film.

For landscapes (with or without foreground), each angle of view has its own advantages and disadvantages. You might want a long tele type lens shot of a foggy mountain range on the horizon, or a 100 degree wide one of the vast landscape.

If you have never owned a wide angle of view lens, it may not be feasible to learn how to master one on a trip into unfamiliar territory.

Or it may give your work a new meaning and direction.

So: what angle of view are you talking about?
And NOT: WHAT FOCAL LENGTH, please.

Ummm... I do have all my gear listed below my name. It's all 35mm. I've used my 21mm a lot.

I can't bring every lens, so I want to see what people's experience is. I wonder if a 21mm is going to give too much foreground. There may be a shot where I'd use a 135mm but not enough to justify bringing it instead of another one.

 

[ferider]

The classic set (for 35mm) is 28/50/90/135 (or 200 for SLR).

If you have a 35, you can skip the 50. Your 35/85/135 Canon/Nikkors should work very well in combo.

If I remember right, Adams used (on 6x6) 50, 80, 150, and 250.

I find anything wider than 28 not useful, since typically, the necessary foreground is not there or not interesting.

Roland.

 

[dazedgonebye]

Something long and something wide.

I've never been to Alaska, but I think you might be dealing with such wide open spaces that you will want to have something telephoto to issolate landscape features.

With a 35mm kit, I would likely take a 70-200 zoom if I had the money and room. Otherwise, any good 135mm or 200mm lens would do for the long end.
On the wide end, I like 21mm most, but get a lot of mileage out of 15mm.
I imagine you'll also want something wide/normal for walking around shots too.

 

[tbarker13]

If I were going out to shoot landscapes, the first thing I'd take would be my Nikkor 80-200. Second would probably be an extreme wide - some thing in the 12-24 range.

If it had to be a RF lens, I guess I'd be looking at a 90mm lens and a 21mm lens.

 

[sleepyhead]

I agree with Tim and some others above - if it were me (wish it was!) I would take the 21 and 135 or a 90. I used such a combo on Lanzarote a few years ago, actually a 17mm and 85mm with a Nikon 35mm SLR, and it was a great combo for landscapes.


DonTWorry, your vision willl adapt to what you bring after a day or two.

Have a great trip!

 

[Roger Hicks]

Long lenses are far more useful than you might expect, and wide-angles far less useful.

On top of this, my own inclination would be to ditch the R -- replace it with an R2 or even a T, so you can use all your lenses on two bodies, instead of having two semi-overlapping systems -- and buy some adapter rings. Then take 35 and 135, supplemented (in this order) by 21, 50 and 85, depending on how much you want to carry.

Tashi delek,

R.

 

[yanidel]

35 - 90 is what I like most for landscapes. 35 will suit most situations and the 90 or more to compress several planes.

 

[newspaperguy]

FWIW- Be sure to stuff the XA in a back pocket for stealth landscapes.

Have a great trip.

 

[pagpow]

I grew up with 50's on 35mm. Now have more lenses than I can reasonably use. I, too, find moderate telephotos both more useful and easier to use effectively in wide open spaces. Wides below 35 can be very effective but, at least for me, require much more care in framing and positioning, not very good for effectively capturing a wide view from a standing position. OTOH, you have quite a few extra wides, so your shooting style may be much more suited to them.
In the flipping mirror world, I take 24, 35 or 50, 85 or 100, 200 OMs and find I use the 200 far more than the 24.

 

[Windscale]

I have ruled out the 135 format for landscape for many years. I am now firmly stuck with 6x6 TLRs, folders and some self-converted cameras with standard to wide lenses, complimented with a light tripod. The idea is to travel light and be capable of enlargements to 24x36 in or 30x30 in. 135 lenses, nomatter how expensive, are just out of the question, and many of them are too heavy.

 

[vrgard]

The answer also depends upon where you're going in Alaska and how you're traveling while there. For example, if you're going to be on a cruise ship then you will want a regular or wider lens for onboard shots and also a longer lens to give you enough reach to isolate a subject distant from the ship.

-Randy

 

[chris00nj]

FWIW- Be sure to stuff the XA in a back pocket for stealth landscapes.

Have a great trip.

I'll definitely bring the XA! That way I can have two bodies & two types of film loaded.

At the end of the day, the 21/4 and the 35/2 are small enough to bring without much trouble. It's the others. The 50/1.5, Nikkor 85/2, and the Nikkor 135/3.5 are big lenses. I can't bring all three.

I'll probably bring the Bessa over the M3, so that rules out the Summicron and the Elmar 90/4 isn't sharp enough. So I'm left with buying a small 50 (but I'm out of GAS), or making selective reductions.

I will be on a ship so I'll be at a decent distant (I am assuming).

Roger's advice to make the switch from the R to the R2M is a good idea, but it'll have to be a long term goal, as I won't have the funds to swing it now.

 

[peterm1]

Oddly enough I shoot a lot of urban landscapes and more often than not I will not use wide angle lenses very much at all. I prefer the focal lengths from 50 to 135.

My style almost invariably involves getting in close to the subject to get details. Sometimes I also like to throw the background out of focus much as one would do with a portrait so again a longer lens is better for this. In my view, stylistically, this approach reveals more to the observer than you can get from an image where you have just stood back and blazed away with a wide angle lens in order to "fit it all in." Also, it is virtually impossible to get the feel of a place from a wide shot with a normal wide lens shooting 2/3 or 4/3 format. You at least need a panoramic format if you want a wide shot. Sometimes I will take wide contextual shots of this sort of course, but these times are in the minority and I will probably take 10 shots with a longer lens for every 1 that I take with a wide lens. And where I do use a wide lens, I usually prefer something like a 35mm over wider lenses most times. When I have used wider lenses I find it is more often than not a struggle to deal with all that damn foreground.

If you are taking an SLR, I can also say that in general I still prefer primes to zooms. Although these days the image quality of the better zooms are near to or as good as good primes, I still like the knowledge that I am shooting with THE best lenses available for the purpose (although having said that they may not be the newest lenses.) And I like the discipline it imposes. If I use a prime it FORCES me to get off my butt and walk around to look for the best point of view. I am lazy and find it too tempting when I have a zoom lens mounted to just stand my ground and "click." You absolutely cannot do this with primes. Having said that if weight is a consideration, then a wide - normal zoom and a normal - long zoom complement each other very nicely of course.

I suppose then the correct answer to which is best lens to use for landscape is that it all depends on your shooting style.

 

[Bingley]

Back in the day, when I worked the salmon canneries in Alaska as a summer job while in college, I took lots of landscape photos w/ a 50 Nikkor on my Nikon F, because that was all I had. I made do. I missed having a decent telephoto, though, for shots of eagles and bears. There were lots of the latter, and at fairly close range, too, so that a 200 would have been nice.

In your situation, and being on a ship, I'd be sure to bring one tele, to isolate and get a little closer to wildlife. Will you be near glaciers? I'd also bring one wide, and maybe a normal lens too. A 50 can be great for landscapes. 35-50-135 (or 85) might be a useful combo. I plan on taking a 28-40-100 kit w/ me this summer on a trip to the Sierras.

 

[Trius]

I would concur with a moderate wide (35), normal and 85-100. Wider than 35 makes landscapes too "tiny" ... unless you have a larger, strong foreground object and capture that near/far effect, and a range of mountains captured with wide or normal loses its impact. The normal (50-ish) is for closer, more detailed work.

So I would take 35, 50 and 100 ... though I would be tempted to bring a 21 or 28, I would probably leave them home. And anything longer than 100 is too much bulk for travel.