DAY 74

NATURE & LANDSCAPES

Farm Fields

THEY GO ON FOREVER

Those who live in farm country are accustomed to the sight of plowed fields and crops receding into the distance. For others, a drive through the countryside can be an eye-opening experience.

Those loaves of bread and cans of beans you see on grocery store shelves actually start there, as seeds planted in precisely spaced rows that follow the contour of the land. There is an inherent beauty in farmland; in fact, the line “for amber waves of grain” came from author Katharine Lee Bates seeing fields of wheat swaying in the breeze.

Photographing crops in a field can range from a wide-angle view of the entire field to a close-up of individual plants. For a wide-angle shot you want to get as much of the photo in focus as possible, which you can accomplish by using the highest number aperture possible, such as f/22 or f/32. Include as much of the foreground plants as possible by going right up to edge of the field and keeping the camera close to the ground. —WTD