9 Easy Steps to Photographing Epic Grand Landscapes
Standard Package
The Full Course-
Epic Grand Landscapes Video Course
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Field Walkthrough
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290-Page Full Course eBook
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Bonus Tech Lessons on Filters and Exposure
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Lightroom Processing Demonstrations
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Virtual Teacher Weekly Email Series
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Instructor Q&A
30-day “If I can’t teach you photography I don’t deserve your money” guarantee
Trusted By Hundreds of Photographers
Frequently Asked Questions
How long is the course?
The video course run time is about 120 minutes. There are 10 chapters comprising 14 total lessons. Most videos are 5-10 minutes long. The additional bonus lessons add another 45-60 minutes of instruction on filters, post-processing, exposure, and more.
How long do I have access to the course?
How does lifetime access sound? After enrolling, you have unlimited access to this course for as long as you like, across any and all devices you own.
Can I download the course lectures, videos, PDFs, and bonuses?
Absolutely! Every lecture, worksheet, and transcript is available for you to download.
What is the Virtual Teacher Weekly Email Series?
The Virtual Teacher is a weekly email series that walks you through the most important parts of each chapter. I know you are busy and sometimes watching a video doesn’t fit into your schedule. But if you have 3 minutes to read an email once a week you will still pick up the absolute most critical parts of each lesson.
How does this course compare to an in-person workshop?
I am working as hard as I can to make sure this course delivers the same value as a workshop, if not more. I don’t want to waste your time or your money so I’ve worked to make sure every lesson is useful, practical, easy-to-understand, quick to consume, and information-dense. Based on my experience teaching workshops I’d say most students can absorb three to four of these techniques in the course of a 3-day workshop. So this course delivers roughly 2-3 workshops’ worth of information that you can consume on your own schedule. And like a workshop with this course you can ask questions, get feedback, and build a community of friends and fellow photographers.
Can I pay with PayPal?
Yes you can. You will see the PayPal option on the checkout screen.
What equipment do I need for this course?
- You will get the most out of this if you have the following gear:
- DSLR / Mirrorless Camera
- Wide or Ultra-Wide Angle Lens
- Sturdy Tripod
- Remote Shutter Release
- GND Filters (Optional)
- Extra Batteries, Memory Cards, Lens Wipes
- Snacks (Not Optional)
I saw another photography course on Udemy that was 15 hours long and cost $20. What’s different about this course?
Think about every “How To” video you’ve ever watched online. Ever notice how the presenters talk for 20 minutes before getting into the actual technique they’re trying to teach? Don’t you wish they would just SHUT UP AND TEACH you how to do what they do?
“Shut Up And Teach” – That’s the philosophy I used when creating the lessons for this course. No filler, no blather. Just fantastic information in easy-to-digest bites.
This is not a sprawling “how to do everything in landscape photography” kind of course, which is what those other courses tend to be. In those ponderous courses you’ve got sit through the instructor talking about a bunch of stuff that’s not relevant to you before you pick up that nugget of info that actually is. Who’s got time to watch 15 hours of video just to learn one salient point?
The whole idea of 9 Easy Steps to Photographing Epic Grand Landscapes is to get you a real photographic transformation in as little time as possible. The techniques I’m presenting in this course took me years to learn, and thousands of dollars in time, travel, excursions, and practice. I want to help you understand them as quickly and easily as I can. You can watch the course this afternoon and start taking epic grand landscape photos tonight.
I also want to keep the community small, engaged, and full of dedicated photographers who genuinely want to learn and improve their photos. I would much rather have 20 really excited photographers in the course than 20,000 who don’t care. “Bargain Basement” online courses don’t provide value, don’t give you incentive to continue learning, and don’t encourage you to achieve the results you’re looking for. This course does.
What if I am unhappy with the course?
I have a full 30-day refund policy. If you have completed at least three lessons and are unsatisfied with your purchase contact me and I will give you a full refund.
Got a different question? Let me know!
Master a practical framework for creating Grand Landscapes.
So that’s what I mean by a practical framework, and that’s what you’re going to learn in this course.
I’d love to ask you a question: have you ever looked at photos on Instagram or in Outdoor Photographer Magazine or on 500px and you were totally blown away, but at the same time you were totally frustrated because your photos didn’t look like those photos?? You know that feeling, inspired but annoyed at the same time? Send me an email and let me know if this has happened to you. It definitely happened to me when I was first learning and I was incredibly frustrated.
I set about dissecting those amazing photos and understanding exactly what they’re made of. I developed my framework of 9 parts, and that’s you’re going to master in this course to start creating your own epic photos.
If that sounds good to you, just hit this button to get your name on the course launch priority list.
HEY! I’M JOSH CRIPPS.
I’ve helped thousands of people improve their photos. Here’s how I can help you.
I’ve been teaching photography for over 10 years. In the beginning I was teaching only myself. But as I began to understand what made a good photo I quickly moved on to assisting other photographers on their workshops, and then to teaching my own. Since then I’ve instructed thousands of photographers in person in some of the most beautiful places in the world.
But I didn’t stop there. I also created Pro Photo Tips, one of the most popular photography channels on YouTube, which has over 300,000 subscribers and 12 million video views (and counting!).
Throughout these years of teaching (as well as refining my own photography) I’ve learned a lot about what makes a good photo and what doesn’t.
I’ve also come to realize when you’re learning photography you need more than just theory. You need practical approaches, step-by-step processes, and go-to ideas about how to craft a winning image. You need a framework to start from that you can build your own creative ideas off of.
That’s why I created 9 Easy Steps to Photographing Epic Grand Landscapes. To give you a framework you can use to create breathtaking photos like the ones you see in magazines.
This course lays out that framework in black and white. There are 10 chapters and 14 total lessons (including a complete start-to-finish walkthrough of how I created one of my favorite Grand Landscape shots) which teach you everything you need to start creating epic grand landscape photos today.
- 10 individual chapters and 14 total instructional video lessons with 120 minutes of kick-ass education. Each lesson is short (most are less than 10 minutes), to-the-point, and digestible. Tons of examples, visuals, and downloads make learning easy and succinct, with clear takeaways for each lesson. No filler and no blather means you get results today.
- 5 additional, complete bonus lessons on in-depth post processing for grand landscapes, using filters, getting a perfect exposure, and more.
- Guided learning at your own pace. You can start and stop the course whenever you like, watch lessons as many times as you want, and skip around in the course curriculum.
- Bonus materials to help your learning. There are tons of example images, handouts, notes, and guides to accompany the lessons, helping you get the most out of the course.
- Q&A. Ask questions and get answers from the instructor. AKA Josh Cripps. AKA me!
Here are just some of the key takeaways you’ll learn inside 9 Steps to Photographing Epic Grand Landscapes.
- The 4 qualities your location needs to work as a Grand Landscape, as well as the kinds of locations that don’t cut the mustard.
- Choosing the right lens for a Grand Landscape and how to vary your focal length to emphasize the parts of the scene most important to you.
- How to tell your story of a landscape by choosing specific foreground, midground, & background elements. Hint: there’s an easy way to tell if you’ve picked the right things.
- The 5 characteristics of an amazing foreground, what makes an outstanding midground, and the single most important thing you should look for in a background element.
- How to pull your viewer into the frame and lead them on a visual journey.
- Using camera position to control the visual flow of your photo.
- Horizon placement and how it affects the story and depth of your images.
- Bulletproof strategies for simplifying and improving your Grand Landscape compositions.
- How to get a scene in focus from front to back every single time.
- How emotional impact determines the shutter speed you should be using.
- Practical methods for understanding your own artistic vision, and creatively applying that to your camera settings.
- A no-nonsense method to picking the perfect aperture and shutter speed every time.
- The simple secret behind creating a painterly feel with the light and exposure of your images.
- The most important post processing steps you can take to make your images pop.
- The secret to happiness. Just kidding. I wanted to see who’s paying attention. Although, you know, if you, if your landscape photography gets better, that is kind of a secret to happiness…
- The three characteristics your landscape needs in addition to beauty.
- Why uniqueness is so important to your grand landscapes.
- Why novelty is so important to your grand landscapes.
- Why simplicity is so important to your grand landscapes.
- The Grand Landscape Location Checklist.
- The kinds of locations that don’t work as well for grand landscapes.
- The lens focal lengths that work best for grand landscapes.
- The two wide angle lens “tricks” you can use to pull your viewer into your photographs.
- How to use focal length and distance from your foreground object to make certain parts of your photo appear larger or smaller depending on what’s important to you.
- The three elements that make up the story of your grand landscape photograph.
- How those three elements relate to a written story to create an opening hook, supporting details and action, and a finale for your photo.
- What NOT to do with your foreground.
- The three kinds of contrast to look for in order to make your foreground element pop.
- How to make sure your foreground is the right size for your photo.
- What makes a great midground.
- How to control your midground.
- Midground best practices.
- The single most important characteristic your background element can have.
- Why the background element is so critical to your photos.
- The Josh Cripps Number 1 Rule of Composition.
- My favorite techniques for removing distractions and simplifying your compositions.
- Walkthrough of my process for simplifying a scene and improving a composition
- The power of leading lines and the visual narrative.
- What is a leading line? Plus tons of examples.
- Best practices for using leading lines.
- How to control your leading lines and have them point exactly where you want.
- Other ways besides leading lines to create connection and strengthen the visual narrative of your photo.
- Still reading? Good job!
- The optimum horizon placement for most grand landscapes.
- How to tell your viewer what’s important in your photo.
- How horizon placement affects the depth of your photos.
- When to NOT place the horizon on the top third.
- Which ISO you should choose for 95% of grand landscapes and why.
- Why you want your entire photo in sharp focus.
- A systematic approach to getting your entire photo in focus from front to back.
- Three solutions to when you can’t get your whole photo in focus.
- The technical and artistic reasons shutter speed is so important.
- How your emotions determine what shutter speed you should use.
- The paradox of artistic intent versus proper exposure.
- How to use your aperture to solve this paradox (i.e. how to target an artistic shutter speed while maintaining a perfect exposure).
- How to use filters to solve this paradox.
- How to use ISO to solve this paradox.
- How to get a perfect exposure every time in manual mode (even for newbies!)
- Solutions for situations where getting a good exposure is difficult, like when shooting into the sun.
- A step-by-step approach to using 10- and 6-stop ND filters for long exposures.
- Three methods of calculating your new shutter speed when using an ND filter.
- How to fine tune your settings for even longer exposure.
- Correcting color issues with strong ND filters.
- Troubleshooting three common ND filter issues.
- A step-by-step approach to using 10- and 6-stop ND filters for long exposures.
- Three methods of calculating your new shutter speed when using an ND filter.
- How to fine tune your settings for even longer exposure.
- Correcting color issues with strong ND filters.
- Troubleshooting three common ND filter issues.
- The reason why Magic Hour is so magical.
- Exceptions to the Magic Hour rule. I.e. other times to shoot grand landscapes.
- The simple secret behind getting a painterly feel in your photos.
- Two methods of getting the painterly feel.
- The perfect exposure adjustment to get the painterly feel.
- How to get a painterly feel through post-processing in Lightroom.
- A complete guide to using Graduated Neutral Density Filters (GNDs).
- The two most important post-processing steps to take with your grand landscape photos.
- Why to shoot neutral picture controls in the field.
- How I add contrast and saturation in Lightroom.
- How I process my landscape photos from start to finish in Lightroom.
- A complete walkthrough of how I create a grand landscape in the field from start to finish.
- Holy cow! You read this whole list??? You’re a rockstar!
- Don’t know why your photos don’t look like those in the magazines.
- Can’t get your photos sharp from front to back.
- Don’t get the color, light, or detail you want in a photo.
- Let your camera make more decisions about your shots than you do.
- Don’t know how to tell if you have a good composition, or if something should be in your frame or not.
- Can’t direct your viewers’ attention in your photos.
- Don’t know which lens to use and why.
- Want to learn how to turn your artistic vision into a photograph.
- Just don’t say WOW when you look at your own photos.
9 Easy Steps to Photographing Epic Grand Landscapes is a course aimed at experienced beginner and intermediate photographers but will be useful for anyone who wants to learn how to create epic Grand Landscape photos.
One example would be Lesson 3, what a forehead slapping revelation that was for me. Josh has broken down ISO, Aperture, & Shutter Speed in a way I have never had it explained before, it seems so easy now!!! I think I have every card with pictures of the lens openings, blurry bunnies and any other kind of reference to try and understand these three beasts, and all it took was a video from Josh for me to finally get it, and how to use them when taking a photo.
This course offers so much information, support and feedback, you would have to attend half a dozen workshops to receive the same amount of knowledge. It not only teaches, but also inspires you to get your camera out of the cupboard and participate in the photo challenges at the end of each lesson. Post them to the community page, get feedback and watch your photos improve every- day.
I could write a novel noting all the things I love about this course, but it would be easier for you to do yourself and your photography a huge favour and join this course, you won’t regret it.”
I think practicing in the field the 4 critical parts of an image before pressing the shutter button will increase my keepers and “WOW” photos immensely. This really is the secret ingredient of wall hanging photos. Each lesson of this course just keeps getting better and better.”
