The Weekly Landscape Thread

This weekly thread, starting on a Friday, allows us to showcase our Landscape photos and get some feedback.
Opening up discussions, not only on content, style, composition & techniques, but also on the emotion in the image, and of course about the place itself.

It’s easy to participate

Post an image or short essay with a title and description. To make it easier to view in the forum, all comments should include the original title and at least one of the original images as a quote.

Thread Guidelines:

1. This thread is for sharing and developing our Landscape photography skills.
2. Entries can be a single image or a short photo essay (2 to 10 connected images that tell a story).
3. Give your entry a clear title and perhaps also explain why you took it, or the story it tells.
4. Provide constructive feedback on others’ images/essays.
   Try to go beyond simple praise or dismissal and explain why you like it, or what caught your eye.
   ”Likes” are encouraged too.
5. Negative feedback and suggestions are also OK (be polite, honest, and constructive).

Giving feedback is just as important as receiving feedback, both help to improve our artistic and technical skills.

What is a Landscape photo?

This means different things for different people. For me, it includes a wide range of photos taken outside, … from wide sweeping vistas to smaller details found along the route. Seascapes, landscapes, cityscapes, woodland shots, landscapes at night with some stars, and lots more are all OK. They could also include man-made objects and people or animals outside, but they are not usually the main subject. Show us, with your photos, what Landscape Photography means to you.

Motivation

I love to go hiking in the natural world and capture photos along the way. It keeps me fit (physically and mentally) and provides some beautiful memories. Processing those images when I return is fun too, it often helps to enhance what I saw.

Downloading and reposting

It’s often challenging to verbalise comments about images. Instead, it’s sometimes easier to “show.” Unless the original poster specifically states otherwise (in each original post), participants are free to download, alter, and repost images in replies to express their analysis and critique. The reposted image may remain permanently or be removed after a short period. Downloaded and altered images shall not be used for any other purposes or uploaded elsewhere.

Enough said,… Go out, enjoy the open air, take some photos. Bring back the memories and post them here in the Weekly Landscape Thread 😊

...looking forward to seeing your images,

Soča valley

I hope you’re all doing well and feeling ready to make some more great landscape photos in 2026.
I went to the gym yesterday to slowly get my back working again after a bout of lumbago over the holidays. It happened on a cold mountain road while I was taking off the snow chains. The German word for lumbago is “Hexenschuss,” which literally means “a shot from a witch,” and honestly feels pretty accurate. A week later things seem to be back to normal, and it’s a relief to be able to put my own socks on again 😊

Anyway, I’m going to have to start here with a photo from the archives; one of my old favourites from Slovenia in 2021.
I’m standing here in the middle of “Napoleon’s bridge” looking down the beautiful Soča valley and viewing both the river and the winding road.
The sun had just appeared to light up the distant forest on this slightly misty autumn morning.
It got printed on canvas (120 x 80 cm) and hung on the wall for quite a while 😉

I like this. Subdued colours and light but a good leading line. Vertical landscapes are always a fave

A couple more from my week in the Alps. Heading back in a couple of weeks. There's been a huge dump of snow, which is continuing so the next images will be very different I hope

We are perched on a high plateau above this village, Albiez le Jeune, which gives for some pleasant views
010126 Albiez le jeune by softmarmotte, on Flickr

and this is across the valley to the large ski resort at La Toussuire. We all joke that they have great views of our little alpine village and we get to look at a 70s eyesore
010126 Albiez view to la toussuire by softmarmotte, on Flickr

Rolling Cascade

When one thinks of a water fall, it is normally a long straight drop of water. In the Souther Appalachians of the US one will find those dramatic drops. However,
because of the hard bed rock - one also finds waterfalls that are a long rolling cascade down the side of the mountain with the wet exposed rock glistening in the sun. I actually prefer these as subjects as there are many micro stories that can be isolated out of the whole.

Nice. Works well in B&W. I do like a waterfall long exposure. Might be cliched but...

I've played around with exposure time for moving water and for me there is a sweet spot of 1/3 to 1 second. To short and you lose the tonal smoothness. Too long it simply smears everything into a much. 1/3 on the short end to 1 on the long seems to be the Goldilocks spot.

I will say again... the IQ from the Panasonic DC-S5D and the LUMIX S 70-300/F4.5-5.6 - very, very good! Both shots. Your PP skills may also be coming into play, but nevertheless, I am impressed with the IQ. :-)

That's beautiful. I like your choice (black and white) which really helps "expose" (as you say)... the "glistening" of the rocks. I'm guessing this was a "naked" shot -- 1/2 sec @ f/13 (no ND filter)? Very good. I have a ND filter (B&W 77 103 ND 0,9 - 3 BL 8x E) and a CP (B&W 77 KSM C-POL MRC) in my bag... but I (basically) never use them! Aye, aye, aye. I really need to stretch my legs. I should really try to do that in 2026.

Anytime you make a big print -- that's GREAT! Cool. Good to hear that your "back" is better! I can relate. I slept "wrong" last night (weird) and woke up kind of stiff. Went for a short walk... and things are fine. I'm 66... not 26. LOL. But overall doing OK physically. Anyway... that is a nice shot. Since I am a "late" participant, I may also have to go to "the archives" one of these weeks... as I have collected some fun stuff over the past year (panos) that might be interesting for the folks here. :-) Thanks for the weekly thread! Very stimulating, which is a good thing. As I said previously, I am HOPING to get up to "the mountains" this month (or at least by next month)... for some skiing... and will take the camera with me. Hopefully! LOL. :-)

Thanks. Yes I am impressed by the detail and the dynamic range. Even more so when I paid for camera and wide angle zoom, 1000 eur and the 70-300 was less than 1000 on top. A real bargain

I really like the mirroring of the road and stream. The color, as mentioned, is great with the tonality. The water itself is just enough different in that shade of blue/teal/green to pop a bit form the rest of the image. I would be curious what cropping a bit off the bottom would do. It feels a bit heavy with the slab of rock on the left bottom and my eye rests further 'in' the image closer to where the road and stream start to share the image. I'm not even sure how far I would crop.

Fall light in the Eastern Sierra.

From trip this last October. The yellows are amazing. It can be information overload sometimes trying to find compositions.

AFTER WORK and OUT BACK - I really like the definition that Fireplace has provided in the thread starter... regarding... "What is a Landscape photo?" – perfect! This coming spring (March/April northern hemisphere) I'm pretty sure I'll be able to get come "classic" landscape shots. Hopefully! I know of a few good vantage points close by, but need some free time to go there and explore. For the time being, since it is dark/winter right now, I'll have to get what I can get. I often carry the camera with me, although right now, when I head back home after work at the end of the day, options are limited. Here is a cityscape (after work; Lake Union) and another “scape” with water, a tug, hills/trees, and mountains (Puget Sound East Passage).

Transhumance

Another archive shot from me. In many parts of the French Alps shepherds still practise transhumance - the process of moving flocks up to mountain pastures for the summer and then down to lowland Provence or the Camargue for the winter. Nowadays they are taken in lorries rather than being driven on foot. In the autumn the flocks come down into the mountain valleys to be loaded up and driven away to their winter homes.

Beautiful gentle colours here, and interesting double leading lines. I wonder if a polarising filter would have brought out the water colour a bit more strongly (or maybe that would be too much)?

Agree on the exposure time. Personally I hate those 'silky water' shots - they completely lose the energy of the water.

The second is lovely, making the most of the transluscent light in the leaves. I wonder if the first would be better if framed a bit to the left, with the nearer trunk falling further to the right. At the moment the right hand part feels a bit empty.