7 Reasons to use Telephoto Lenses for Landscape Photography

Let face it – We landscape photographer love to shoot with wide angle lenses. And there is a very good reason for it. When you arrive at a breath taking location you are so over whelmed with the sights and sounds that your first instinct is to pull out that wide angle lens and capture everything around you. So it is no wonder that telephoto lenses are not used as often in landscape photography. However telephoto lenses has potential to take your landscape photography in whole different direction. To effectively use telephoto lenses you will have to change your mindset and look at things a bit differently.

Here are few idea to help you make most out of your telephoto lenses.

#1: Catch Wildlife in Action

I will be first to admit that there are places where you can get really close to wildlife such as in the zoo, but it is rare that you will be able to get close to wildlife in nature. If you really want to pursue wildlife photography in a natural setting you will need a good telephoto lenses. While we do not always shoot wildlife, we will almost always carry a telephoto lens with us just in case an opportunity to capture wildlife presents itself.

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  Wildlife photography with a telephoto Lens by Varina Patel in Costa Rica

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  Bird photography with a Sony 100-400 F4-5.5 lens by Varina Patel, Costa Rica

This is exactly what happened when we traveled to Costa Rica to create a creative nature photography video tutorial with Lensbaby lens. The abundance of magnificent birds in Costa Rica made is hard for a landscape photographer not to pull out their telephoto lenses for wildlife photography. Sometime when we are travelling to a location like Costa Rica and we know that there is potential to shoot wildlife, we will rent a good quality telephoto lenses just so that we don’t miss any opportunity that may present itself.

#2: Photography Distant Vistas

When we were in Peru we can see the mountains all around us and every once in a while a storm would roll in and create some breath taking light among the mountains and valley surrounding us. These storms and light would be fleeting. They would be there one moment and withing minutes the would vanish. There was almost no opportunity for us to drive to the location and capture the scene with a wide angle lens. So the obvious choice here was to use a telephoto lens to capture the distance vista.

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  Iceland

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  Explore landscape photography with Telephoto Lenses

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  Storm over mountains in Moray, Peru by Jay Patel

Telephoto lenses can also be used to capture a scene that is located on private property, or object that are out (such as objects on side of a cliff) or allows you to capture some fantastic aerial photos.

#3: Capture Small Subjects

When we think about small subject we immediately think about macro photography, but there are subject that are large enough to be captured by a long lens. Any subject that does not require 1-1 magnification can be captured by your long lens. Here are few example of small subject that were captured using a long lens.

Skittish gecko captured with Sony 70-200 F4 Telephoto lens, Big Island, Hawaii by Jay Patel

Some living subjects like the gecko in Hawaii hard to photography because they are scared of human approaching them too close. For these subject a long lens will allow you to stand away from your subject and capture them without disturbing them.

#4: Explore Creativity

When arrived at artist paint pots I asked the students to get ready to shoot. And almost all of them got their camera with wide angle lenses trying to get ready to shoot.

We had to explain to the students that we were at Artist Paint Pots in middle of the day to capture some beautiful abstract with our long lenses and showed them an example we had taken earlier. Our students spend next 2 hours trying to capture some fantastic abstract of mud as it exploded at this beautiful location.

Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming

Not only did this location required us to look at things creatively, but you had to use creative thinking to overcome technical challenges such getting everything sharply in focus, freezing motion and dealing with incredible short window of time to capture an exploding bubble.

#5: Isolate your subject

Telephoto lenses tend to have an incredibly narrow depth of field. While this can be challenging if you are trying to get everything in sharply in focus, it can be very useful to isolate your subject from your background.

Marble – Colorado, USA

Here is a shot that Varina too in Colorado with a long lens to isolate this aspen using a shallow depth of field. She used fall foliage and other aspens as her back drop to give this image a sense of time and place. You can also use the shallow depth of field to isolate wildlife, flowers and other small subject from is background.

#6: Change Perspective

It is a well know fact that telephoto lenses will amplify distant object. You can use this property to change the perspective in your landscape photo. We often use telephoto lenses when we want to magnify the distance objects for landscape photography.

While photographing this church at a remote location in Iceland, I used a long lens to magnify the mountain behind the church. This allowed me isolate the bright church against the dark mountain behind it.

This quality of magnifying distance landscapes using telephoto lenses can be an excellent creative asset. We have used it to include moon in our landscape photos, create panorama, fill the frame with passing storm and more. Here is another example from Iceland where I used a long lens to create a panorama from this mountain range.

Vik, Iceland

#7: Shoot at All Times of Day

Depending upon the subject matter you can be out shooting with telephoto lenses are all times of day. Both the abstract from  Yellowstone National Park and wildlife photos from Costa Rica were captured at midday. The narrow field of telephoto lenses combined with small size of the subject made it easy for us to find subjects that were evenly lit even during the midday.

This meant that our time on location was utilized much more efficiently and we were able to come away some fantastic photos that our wide angle lenses would not be able to capture.

While Telephoto lenses can be highly effective for landscape photography they are not always easy to use. They come with their own set of challenges that need to be overcome to produce sharp stand out photos. Our Telephoto Lenses for Landscape Photography Tutorial will show you how we overcome challenges, be creative, and fill your portfolio with awe-inspiring photos.

So next time you are traveling for landscape photography workshop or visiting a location where there is abundant wildlife make sure to bring your favorite telephoto lens with you.

About Author Jay Patel

I could startoff like this – “Seeds of Jay Patel’s appreciation for beautiful places were planted early in his childhood….” but it would get boring really fast. I will just sum it up and say that I am a Landscape and Wilderness Photographer who loves to capture dramatic light. My photographs have been published in various magazines, calendars and advertising materials throughout the world.
Patience is a virtue...unless you are chasing your dreams

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Sourced by Time Trap Photography sharing the best photography tips, news and tricks throughout the industry. Time Trap Photography is dedicated to freezing those special moments in life that can be revisited and admired for generations to come. - Shannon Bourque
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