Cloudy peaks of the Annapurna mountain range - Image Breakdown

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Trekking in the Himalayas is a unique experience. An experience characterised by days spent climbing several thousand feet, from alpine forests brimming with gushing waterfalls to barren stretches along high-altitude passes where only the majestic mountains keep you company. A handful of tiny villages dot the sparse trail offering homely food and rustic shelter to weary travellers. Tadapani village is one such settlement along the Ghorepani-Ghandruk trekking route and is nestled among the Himalayas at an altitude of close to 9000 feet. Standing in this little village, you see them anywhere you turn - the massive forms of the mountains in the Annapurna range, towering above the chilly landscape. It’s not often that the skies are clear, which means that the peaks themselves are usually hidden by clouds. But once in a while, the clouds part and you can catch a glimpse of sheer majesty.

Canon 500D and Tamron 18-200mm Di II VC lens at 150mm, 1/200 secs, f/13, ISO 100 .

Gaylor lakes sunset - Image Breakdown

Scroll through for a breakdown of this image of Gaylor Lake in Yosemite National Park and a look at the camera settings.

Landscape photography involves a great deal of walking, climbing, and waiting. A lot of waiting. Waiting to get to your chosen location for the shoot, waiting while you scout out suitable locations for unique compositions, waiting for the sun and the clouds to cast the best light on the scene, and waiting for the various elements in your composition to line up just right. All this, for an image captured by your camera in under second as you press that shutter button. We think that a photograph is born in the split second a camera takes the picture, but often overlook the preparation that leads up to that instant. But in the words of Ansel Adams - you don’t take a photograph, you make it.

Captured in 1/4th of a second on the Canon 500D using the Canon EF-S 18-55mm IS lens at 20mm, f/16, ISO 100, after 2 weeks of planning for a 3-hour hike at an altitude of over 10,000 feet and a 5-hour drive away from home. Scouting the location and waiting for sunset took another hour or so.

Mountain peak fail - Image Breakdown

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Photography, like any other craft, requires practice and repetition to hone and perfect. The more time one puts in to working on making images, the better one becomes at spotting what works and what does not. For every image I create that I am happy with, there are dozens that will never make it to my portfolio or be shared for others to see. Over the past 8 years, there have been, quite literally, hundreds of frames that have ended up on the proverbial cutting floor, languishing on a hard drive in my closet.

And yet, there is much to learn from failure. What makes an image that fails to impress? What compositional choices fell short? What could have been done different? In an age in which we strive to share only our best work online, what lessons can we learn from our “not-as-good”? This is one such image, an image that will never be included in my portfolio. But maybe we can learn a few things from this image which, while not bad, is not great.

What do you think? How would you improve this image? Would you like to see more failure analysis posts like this?

Captured on the Canon 500D with the Tamron 18-200mm Di II VC lens at 176mm, 8 secs, f/13, ISO 100