5 handy tips for breathtaking view photos with your smartphone
You are on vacation and you have the chance to photograph the most beautiful views. Whether from the Veluwe in the Netherlands or from the golden beach of Curaçao: nature is often overwhelmingly beautiful. Although you can never capture exactly what you see and feel when you stand there, you can make a good effort to take a nice view photo. Here are five tips to get that done.
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1. Look higher up
One of the most important pieces of advice for panoramic photos is to look higher up. A photo of Rotterdam is great, but from the Euromast the skyline makes just that little bit more impact. Often when you stand on a tower, a mountain or even a small hill, you can capture much more in the picture. So have fun! Most of the photos in this article are also taken from a higher point: it just saves a lot.
It is a pity about the terrace at the bottom, but you would never have been able to get all this in the picture from below.
2. Play with the wide-angle lens
The wide-angle lens can be your best friend with panoramic photos, but also your worst enemy. The wide-angle lens can make sure your photo is completely taken over by the sea (or the beach, as we also mentioned in our beach photo article). But sometimes it can also give a very cool effect, especially if there is a building in your photo. The wide-angle lens can also sometimes create a very beautiful sky (but, bland as it is, also a very ugly one). It’s always worth a try, after all, you can delete the photo at the touch of a button.
This photo wouldn’t have turned out great with a wide-angle lens: there’s too much on the side edges that would give away the wide-angle effect (and probably look a bit stretched).
3. Check the weather
It’s not something you can do much about with your phone, but you can check it on your phone: the weather. It makes a huge difference whether you have a sun or a gray bin of misery in the form of rain clouds. The latter certainly does not have to be a negative point for the end result: you probably know those beautiful photos of Iceland with those ponies and that dark sky above: phenomenal. Only yes, in most cases the sun does provide more color in your photo and a more pleasant stay during shooting.
This photo would look very different on a rainy day with a thunderstorm.
4. Think about the foreground
You can of course take a nice view shot as it is, but by bending your knees or paying attention to the best angle, you can get some more things in the foreground that make the photo a bit more interesting. It really does not detract from the view by photographing some plants in the foreground (possibly out of focus): it actually provides more depth in the photo or a nice view. It makes a view that might look a bit bare in the foreground a lot more interesting.
Having something in the foreground can create more depth (also see if you can use a bokeh effect for an extra dramatic depth effect).
5. Watch out for reflections
Coming back to the first tip about looking higher up: that’s very smart, but sometimes you’re in a chairlift or you’re standing in a tall building and you have to take the picture through the glass. That usually does not give the best result. You often see reflections in it, making your view photo fairly worthless. We can give you a tip to pay attention to it, but yes: you do little about it. At least, there is a tip to follow, although not every phone enthusiast feels comfortable with it: you really have to push your phone on the glass. So make sure there can be no reflection, because your camera is printed almost directly on the glass. Do it carefully, but you will notice that the difference is huge.
You can see it especially on the Gherkin: there is such a clear glow on the building that this photo is on the verge of being thrown away.
Do you have any good tips for taking pictures of vistas? Share them in the comments.
Want more photography tips? Maybe from the beach, or else iris photos, photos of food, mountains on winter sports, the northern lights, a concert or flowers. Prefer a selfie? That is also possible. Also listen to our podcast about smartphone photography:
