Since a lot of us travel to some pretty exotic places with spectacular scenery, I thought I would mention that getting a sense of scale into your photographs might add some information to the viewer.

I went to Namibia in 2009 with my first digital camera and during the trip went to Sossusvlei and Deadvlei with my daughter.




My Nikon D60 (10 megapixels) had the kit zoom lens which goes from 18mm to 105mm. So, not really pro equipment and the scale of the place made it pretty much impossible to get it all in one picture. I realized the only way I could get across the size of the place would be to put a person in the photographs whenever I could.




You may notice that the same dead tree is in both of the above pictures. Below are two pictures to give another example. In the first, taken at the zoom's widest angle, you get an idea of how big the pan at Deadvlei is, but you don't really see much and the people in the picture are so small as to be hardly discernible. In the second, from the same vantage point, I set the zoom at it's maximum focal length of 105mm.






In the first picture with the wide angle I was trying to "get it all in", but in the end I think the picture taken with the telephoto focal length gives a better sense of scale. So, wide angles don't always work best for landscapes, especially when the dunes are the size of mountains.

Here is another pair to show the same thing:



The wide angle above, the telephoto below.





And by the way, if you hunt Namibia but don't take a little time to go to the Namib desert, you only have yourself to blame.




All pictures were taken with the same camera and the same lens on the same day, 16 July 2009.

Thanks Wink. Excellent advice, and yes, I hunted Namibia and no, I did not see the desert, the Skeleton Coast, Etosha or Swakopmund!
Dopey moi ...

Don't be afraid to experiment, but of course it helps if you've got a willing model at hand. What I wanted to do was give a sense of texture (which also means scale) of what is underfoot at the Deadvlei pan. As taken, horizontally, the photograph seemed somehow unappealing to me, but when rotated to vertical it became visually much better. Think outside of the box from time to time. (And get your white balance right if you want your skin tones to look natural!)



I realize I sound like I'm flogging a dead horse pretty often, but all of the above photographs were taken with the cheapest Nikon DSLR made in 2009, which you could probably buy for less than $100 today. I keep repeating this only to say that really, it's not about the equipment.

Wink,

Great post, and great photos. Thanks!

A couple years ago I took a photo that shows scale with a person, and I knew there was something to it back then but didn't really grasp it 'til now.



The same scene, on a different day:



Took those shots with a $50 refurbished Nikon L26.

phone . yesterday. should have done a side shot. lamp post is distracting.

PS awesome pic.s Wink