Often when it comes to landscape photography, one of our primary concerns is finding the best way of getting to infinity in terms of depth-of-field. In our quest to getting to infinity, we also need to think about the required shutter speed given any movement caused by wind, as well as our ISO value. As we all know, the higher the ISO value used, the less dynamic range we will have available for our photographs.
Professional landscape photographers will do a lot of subject/location research and plan the capture of their images based on a number of factors. Some of these include weather conditions, wind speed, sun angle, season, and time of day. They know their camera gear intimately and plan the exact focal length they will use, as well as aperture, ISO value, and shutter speed.
NOTE: Click on images to enlarge.

I must confess that I don’t plan my images to that extent. This is especially true when I’m on holidays and I’m shooting on a catch-as-catch-can basis under time constraints. This was the situation with the image above captured at Peggy’s Cove in Nova Scotia last summer.
Landscape Photography Basics
I do follow a few basics for my landscape photography.
- Use the lowest ISO value possible and shoot at base ISO-200 with my Olympus gear whenever I can.
- Use the shortest focal length I can given my desired composition, and given the physical limitations I may face… get in tight to subjects when possible,
- Choose a focusing point that will help ensure that my foreground will be in focus, as well as getting to infinity with my depth-of-field.
- Stop my lens down if needed to a maximum of f/8 to help avoid the affects of diffraction.
If you check the EXIF data on the image above you’ll see that I used a focal length of 22 mm, with an aperture of f/8, at ISO-200 with a shutter speed of 1/320. What you don’t see is that I picked a focusing point that was 4.6 metres away (~15 feet). This would create depth-of-field in the foreground from about half the distance in front of my focusing point, and give me depth-of-field behind that focusing point to infinity when using f/8. If I would have used an aperture of f/5.6 my depth-of-field would have been limited to about 19 metres (~62 feet).
Obviously the optical properties of the lens we use will affect image sharpness. In this case I used my wife’s M.Zuiko 14-150 mm f/4-5.6 II zoom lens.
Let’s have a look at another image captured with that same lens and examine the depth-of-field in the photograph.

In this case we can see that deep depth-of-field was achieved from the foreground all the way out to infinity. This was made possible by using a focal length of 14 mm, at f/5.6, with a focusing point 2.7 metres (~8.8 feet) away from my shooting position. This would give me depth-of-field beginning at 1.45 metres (4.75 feet) in front of my focusing point all the way to infinity.

Depth-of-Field Calculator
Some photographers have a depth-of-field calculator on their cellphones so they can check depth-of-field on a regular basis as they are composing landscape images. No doubt this can be a very handy reference tool to have at your disposal. I’ve never been sufficiently disciplined to use something like that.
Over the years I have used a few zoom lenses on a very frequent basis for my landscape photography. I kept a few composition guidelines in mind which made getting to infinity an easier proposition.

Nikon 1 Landscape Guidelines
For example, one of my favourite Nikon 1 lenses for landscape photograph was the 1 Nikkor 6.7-13 mm f/3.5-5.6. When shot wide open at f/3.5 at the widest angle of the focal length range (i.e. 6.7 mm) I knew that if I chose a focusing point 1.2 metres away (~3.9 feet) I would have acceptable depth-of-field from about 0.6 metres (~2 feet) all the way out to infinity.
If I used the longest focal length of 13 mm for that lens at f/5.6, as long as I used a focusing point about 2.8 metres (~9.2 feet) away, I would have depth-of-field from 1.4 metres (4.6 feet) to infinity. If I needed more depth-of-field than that I could stop that lens down to f/8. This would allow me to use a focusing point 2 metres (~6.6 feet) away, and get acceptable depth-of-field from about 1 metre (3.3 feet) all the way to infinity.
Another Nikon 1 lens that I used extensively for landscape photography was the 1 Nikkor 10-100 mm f/4-5.6 zoom. When shot wide open at f/4 at the widest focal length of 10 mm, getting to infinity required me choosing a focusing point about 2.3 metres (~7.6 feet) away. This would give me acceptable depth-of-field from about 1.15 metres (3.8 feet) to infinity. If I needed more depth of field I could stop the lens down to f/5.6. This would give me acceptable depth-of-field from about 0.9 metres (~3 feet) to infinity.

Olympus M4/3 Landscape Guidelines
Now that I am using Olympus M4/3 gear as my primary system I typically use one of three lenses for landscape photography. These include the M.Zuiko PRO 7-14 mm f/2.8, the M.Zuiko PRO 12-40 mm f/2.8 and the M.Zuiko PRO 12-100 mm f/4 IS zoom lenses.
My depth-of-field guidelines for the M.Zuiko PRO 7-14 mm f/2.8 are as follows.
- At 7 mm at f/2.8 I can choose a focusing point 1.4 metres (4.6 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from 0.8 metres (~2.6 feet) to infinity.
- Stopping that lens down to f/4 at 7 mm allows to choose a focusing point 0.9 metres (~3 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from about 0.5 metres (1.6 feet) to infinity.
- At 14 mm wide open at f/2.8 I can use a focusing point 4.7 metres (15.4 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from about 2.4 metres (7.8 feet) to infinity.
- Stopping that lens down to f/4 at 14 mm allows to choose a focusing point 3.4 metres (~11 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from about 1.7 metres (5.6 feet) to infinity.
When using the M.Zuiko PRO 12-40 f/2.8 or PRO 12-100 f/4 IS zoom lenses my guidelines are as follows:
- At 12 mm at f/2.8 I can choose a focusing point 3.4 metres (~11 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from 1.7 metres (~5.6 feet) to infinity.
- Stopping the lens down to f/4, or shooting with the PRO 12-100 f/4 IS wide open allows me to use a focusing point 2.5 metres (~8 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from about 1.3 metres (~4.3 feet) to infinity.
- Stopping down one of those lenses further to f/5.6 allows me to choose a focusing point 1.7 metres (5.6 feet) away and achieve acceptable depth-of-field from 0.85 metres (2.8 feet) away to infinity.
What this tells us is that if you happen to own the M.Zuiko PRO 12-100 f/4 IS or M.Zuiko PRO 12-40 f/2.8 zoom as long as you are using a focal length of 12 mm and not trying to focus any closer than 1.7 metres away for a landscape image, there is no reason from a depth-of-field perspective to use an aperture beyond f/5.6.

Using Longer Focal Lengths Changes the Parameters
As we know, the longer the focal length that is used the shallower the depth-of-field will become. When it comes to landscape photography and getting to infinity with our depth-of-field, we typically want to squeeze as much dynamic range out of our camera gear as we can. Using shorter lens focal lengths can help us keep our ISO values as low as possible given the shooting conditions we face.
Like many photographers I’ve stopped my lenses down beyond what was needed to achieve my desired depth-of-field. Some of that was due to expediency on my part when on holidays. And, some of it was due to me not adequately thinking about what was actually needed to create my images. When we have enough light and we can shoot at base ISO there is no penalty to be paid. In less-than-ideal conditions we may be paying a price in a loss of dynamic range. Using shorter focal lengths can help us use a lower ISO value in these critical situations.

Technical Note:
Photographs were captured handheld using camera gear as noted in the EXIF data. Images were produced from RAW files using my standard approach in post. This is the 1,241 article published on this website since its original inception in 2015.
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Excellent explanation, Tom!
Thanks Bill… I’m glad it was helpful.
Tom