These tools can help you take better landscape photography.

Photography is the art of using light. Portrait photographers can use all kinds of flashlights to create scenes and atmosphere, while landscape photographers can only resign themselves to fate. So when shooting natural scenery, there are often photographers who stay in one place for a few days and wait for a long time in order to wait for a suitable fine weather.

Besides light, the angle of the scene and composition is also important. Therefore, before shooting, especially going to some unfamiliar places, or even going to a strange place for the first time, you should be prepared as much as possible before leaving, so as to take the desired photos conveniently.

Internet is a very useful tool, which has brought many benefits to photographers and helped them to find the right lighting, composition and shooting angle. So I will recommend several very useful websites and applications to help landscape photographers plan their shooting better.

Landscape photographers rely entirely on the rays of the sun, so it is very important to master the angle of the sun. Only when the best light angle is obtained in the scene to be shot can the best work be shot.

Suncalc？ This website can help you observe the angle of light very well. Select the target position to be photographed, and then you can see the position of the sun in one day. For landscape photographers, the most important sun angle at sunrise and sunset seems clear at a glance. Not only the recent sunrise and sunset, including dawn, noon and dusk, but also the time is clearly listed. You can drag the time axis at the top to observe the lighting angles at different time periods.

This not only helps to shoot outdoor scenes such as famous mountains and rivers, but also helps the city climb the party. There are many tall buildings in the city, which often block the light. Knowing them clearly in advance can avoid wasting time and missing the best shooting opportunity.

Light is important, but so is terrain. The light is everywhere, but the beautiful terrain is not. It is precisely because of the pleasant scenery in the western region that so many people take the Sichuan-Tibet line and the most beautiful 3 18 highway. Similarly, the Norwegian fjords and the aurora in Iceland attract tourists from all over the world because of their beauty.

Thanks to Google for providing GoogleEarth and using it for free. Google Earth not only provides global satellite data, but also updates it regularly. At the same time, Google is gradually realizing the 3D map. The latest realization is a big city like Tokyo, new york. Almost all buildings are modeled in 3D, so you can visually see what the scene is like.

Google has been collecting street views since a few years ago. Up to now, many cities around the world have street views, and you can observe the scenic spots in the city without leaving home. This is very helpful for photography and tourism planning, and can avoid less detours.

But unfortunately, due to our special national conditions, there is no data of GoogleEarth Street View in China at present. In addition, there are few 3D images in cities, and only a few users build their own models and upload buildings, which is almost negligible compared with 3D images in developed countries in Europe and America. Hong Kong's 3D and street views are covered, so you can browse at will.

It should be emphasized that Google Earth is very important for landscape photographers and stair-climbing photographers. For the purpose of protecting seats, we usually don't discuss seats in public. A photographer doesn't like to be asked to sit after posting his rock climbing works. Therefore, to use Google Earth to find airplane seats, you need to master some skills, understand some landmark buildings in cities, and then determine airplane seats according to the proportion of pictures.

Google Earth currently has a web version and a desktop version. Comparatively speaking, the desktop version has more functions. The desktop version of Google Earth can set different target times to see how the sun shines at a specific time. Moreover, the desktop version of Google Earth has a measurement function, which is convenient for measuring the distance between nodes in different paths, and is particularly helpful for travel planning.

Shooting the starry sky also needs some planning to get the best picture, and it is difficult to achieve satisfactory results blindly.

Stellate cell

Stellarium is a free and open source software, which can simulate starry sky scenes everywhere. You can see the information of any star in the night sky. Especially when shooting the Milky Way, the position of the Milky Way in the sky is different at different times of the year, and the time when the arch bridge of the Milky Way rises in the night sky is also different, so it is particularly necessary to master this information in advance.

Choose your own location in Stellarium, search for place names or directly enter GPS coordinates. If the shooting location is not far from a city, you can use the current coordinates, and the perspective is not obvious. Then you can adjust the target time and see the starry sky when you plan to shoot.

It should be noted that whether shooting the track or shooting the starry sky, you should try to avoid shooting under the full moon. The brightness of the moon is strong during the full moon, which will affect the orbit of stars and the visibility of the Milky Way. The best shooting time is within a few days before and after the new moon. If the time is not allowed to be adjusted back and forth in a wide range, especially when shooting on the road, the time is tight, so try to shoot with your back to the direction of the moon.

In fact, Stellarium is not only helpful for starry photography, but also helpful for learning and research. Stellarium contains detailed information and may even cultivate your interest in the starry sky.

Star walk

Starwalk is a starry sky simulation App on mobile phone, which can help you find what you need. For starry sky shooting, Star Walk can help you find the location of the Milky Way in the night sky, the location of some bright stars, and some detailed information about them. It can be said that besides shooting in the starry sky, you can also learn some astronomical knowledge.

When using, you can see the current state of the starry sky by adjusting the position and angle of the mobile phone up, down, left and right. When you use it at night, it can easily help you find your goal. You can also adjust the time to a future time, find the location of the Milky Way, plan ahead and make full preparations.

In addition to light and scenes, weather is also important for shooting. It is precisely because the weather is very important and has a great influence that so many photographers wait in one place for a long time for a good weather.

atmospheric pollution

China is a big country that produces smog, which also has a great negative impact on shooting. So be sure to check the state of smog before going out. Although I have talked about how to remove the smog in the photo, this situation should be avoided as much as possible, because the picture blocked by the smog can't be recorded by the camera, so even if the smog is removed later, the shooting effect without smog can't be achieved.

aqicn.org？ It is a website dedicated to inquiring about smog pollution. Here you can see the data of meteorological data collection points in various cities. The air quality from the best to the worst * * * has green, yellow, orange, red, purple, brown and other levels. When the air pollution has reached purple, it is already very serious. It is not recommended to shoot under such conditions.

weather forecast

In addition to understanding the current air pollution situation before shooting, the weather is also very important. The scenery on a cloudy day is definitely not as beautiful as that on a sunny day. There are many tools to choose from for weather forecast.

As long as it is a weather forecasting tool, whether it is a website or a mobile App, it is nothing more than the number of functions, and there is not much difference. However, some apps or foreign websites use domestic weather data such as AccuWeather, which may not be as accurate as domestic weather data. Because the system is in English and the data source of the weather App of the system is also foreign, it is not very accurate. I have suffered a lot.

Being well prepared can save you a lot of detours. It is very necessary for landscape photographers to observe the weather, terrain and light in advance.