Does your neighborhood (or region) offer too few landscape opportunities?

[Heroique]

Does your neighborhood offer too few LF landscape opportunities?

• If yes, is it your neighborhood's fault, your equipment's, or yours? If you can, please explain your situation.
• If no (i.e., your local opportunities are boundless), what are the associated risks, if any, to your LF work? And how do you address them?

As for me, I’m a "no" person. I'm blessed by the natural beauty of my immediate region (Pacific NW). Craggy mountains, steamy volcanoes, wave-splashed sea stacks, heaven-high waterfalls, giant evergreen trees. But I fear my region's "ease" often fails to challenge, and therefore improve, my ability to visualize or compose. One way I try to "stay sharp" is to do LF studies of individual subjects over time. For example, a slowly dying tree over the years – or a creek bend from the same viewpoint under various kinds of weather or water flow. I've discovered that a long-term relationship with a unique subject keeps my artistic attention from being scattered by the boundless landscape opportunities around me, like a kid in a candy shop.

Whether yes or no, what thoughts can you share that might help the rest of us?

[Jac@stafford.net]

My area is beautiful, but I've walked, ridden and driven through it for so long I no longer see it. My fault!

[Heroique]

I know what you mean – when the repeated familiarity of seeing interferes with the imaginative insight of vision.

One tried-and-true personal solution...

If hiking, leave the trail with (or without) map and compass and invite Zen to help out.

And if driving, take the other fork.

[Jmarmck]

Well, the grass is greener on the other side of the fence. But here the grass is actually greener. Everything is greener...............but that is not what I want. One can only shoot palmetto plants so much. Agri gets boring after the first couple trips. Swamps do not lend themselves to hiking. There is virtually NO public land in south Georgia. (Bryan will probably object). No natl parks, forests, or monuments. It is all private. Even the public land is private "Jones Center". You cannot float the lower Ichawaynochaway Creek because the Jones Center will not allow it. I do have conservation land as a neighbor. It is and old abandoned golf course. Unkept for the most part, except where I choose to mow. There is virtually no fall colors here. No snow. There is lightning but this year has been a very poor season.

Still, if I could find the time I always find something to shoot. But this is not Monument Valley, Death Valley, Escalante River, Mammoth Lakes, or even the Ozarks/Ouachita Mtns. of my birth state of Arkansas. What do all the places have in common, Mountains. I live in the coastal planes. Boo Hoo.

[Bill_1856]

I grew up in a beautiful area of East Tennessee, but never made any significant landscape photos.
When I go back 60 years later I can see the beauty, but still am unable to see any way to photograph it, any more than as Edward Weston once quoted in derision: "Ain't Nature Grand."

[Corran]

There is virtually NO public land in south Georgia. (Bryan will probably object).

Nah I agree. GA sucks. That's why I'm in Florida more and more. It does suck to have to drive many miles away to get somewhere, as opposed to it being "in the neighborhood" so to speak.

I'm lucky that there is one local patch of land I can hike but it's 1) treacherous during the rainy season 2) sometimes dangerous due to the types of people hanging out there and 3) I've about photographed it to death!

Bill, I think some people just don't like/see landscapes. You might be one of them (I don't mean this as an accusation or derogatorily, fyi).

[Jody_S]

I have 2 very photogenic municipal parks within 5 miles of me. I often walk or cycle there. There are 2 more quite large ones within another 2-3 miles. Yes I do have to challenge myself to see something new each time. Besides that, I have to drive 2+ hours to get anywhere there is 'scenery'.

[Greg Miller]

It strikes that the entire question is faulty (assuming this question is specific to landscape photography). We don't photograph objects, we photograph light on objects. If beautiful photographs relied on beautiful objects, most photographs would not exist. A mediocre subject in great light makes for a much more compelling photo than a great photo in mediocre light.

We don't need a wealth of beautiful landscapes, we just need to see the light falling upon the landscape that we have. Was/is Herandez always a great subject? I think not. Only in the right light did it make for a great subject. Here is one of my favorite personal photos . Its a boring subject in a boring location. I took the same photo about 5 minutes later (just for demo purposes) after the light changed and its an awful photo.

[Old-N-Feeble]

My area definitely has no grand landscapes. I could drive a day or two to see some 'okay' landscapes. The only thing to do is search for small hidden gems within the limits here. No excuses regarding getting no decent images but no grandiose places like Yellowstone or Yosemite to be seen.

[Heroique]

There is virtually NO public land in south Georgia. (Bryan will probably object). No natl parks, forests, or monuments. It is all private.

I've always been curious about Okefenokee Nat'l Wildlife Refuge/Wilderness, and I’m curious if you or others, perhaps Corran, have been there. With LF gear, of course. Any reports about its potential?

I imagine that despite its great size and romantic scenery, there are probably very few places of terra firma to plant a tripod!

And what about nearby Cumberland Island Nat'l Seashore? I've never been there either, but I can only imagine how thrilling it would be to disappear for several days into its interior of Live Oaks and hanging mosses, or explore its lonely beaches with my LF gear.

I don't remember the southeastern corner of Georgia being discussed here as a rich place for LF landscape opportunities, but maybe it should be?