ImageZ Club Night – Capturing Mood And Atmosphere In Landscape Photography – Guest Speaker Sarah Howard
Attendees 39 31.1.23
Sarah Howard gave a presentation to our club on Tuesday evening on how to capture and create mood in Landscape.
She began by asking the audience how to create feeling in our images?
She went on ,“How can we draw our viewer in to feel what we were feeling when we took the image?”
Using many of her own images Sarah began to show how the photographer can create mood by choosing certain elements such as Weather, Water, Sky, Light, Colour, Composition, and photographing during different seasons and at various times of day.
Sarah suggested two examples “By choosing crashing waves with dark clouds you create an image that can make the viewer feel fearful or have a sense of the drama.
However, an image of a softened waterfall with greenery around can create a magical look.
Sarah’s image to illustrate this, was a waterfall in the Vale of Neath, quiet and surrounded by trees and greenery ,the water softened by a slow shutter speed portrayed an ethereal feeling very well. Another idea Sarah explained was the use of mist to soften a landscape or create a mysterious feel to a place.
Some of Sarah’s images were shot in Tuscany showing layers of misty mountains and soft brown fields. These she said create feelings of peace and tranquillity.
A lone tree in quite a stark composition, she said gave us feelings of Loneliness, Isolation, or Solitude.
The use of light she explained was very important, it can be used as back light on mountains to draw the eye through the image as in the accompanying image below. Or it can create fabulous shadows and the golden light seen at Sunrise or Sunset can add a warmth to the whole image or light up aspects of your image to focus upon.
Sarah went on to show her wonderful images illustrating numerous ways and techniques to create feelings in the viewer for her images.
The presentation was very inspiring and covered considerable ways to enhance our images for the photographer.
Sarah was able to tell us every location for her images and in some cases where she had used long exposures to calm seas or smooth waterfalls and the shutter speed she had used. Sarah talked us through every image letting us know why she had used a particular composition, colour, shutter speed or the story and mood she was trying to create with the technique she had used .She urged us to go out in all weathers to get a different atmosphere and to get up before dawn to journey through the different lights as the day goes on. The presentation gave us all food for thought and was very interesting and inspiring.
Sarah has a website which you can visit if you wish to revisit her images or to find out about her workshops. www.sarahhowardphotography.com
Next week Challenge Cup #3 (Monochrome & OPEN)
Well done Carol, an excellent blog.