So you want to win a landscape photography award? In recent years, I have been both an award-winner in the Sony Affiliate Alpha Awards (2025) and a Category Judge of the Landscape category of the main Sony Alpha Awards for several years. I can tell you that it's no mean feat looking through hundreds (sometimes thousands!) of entries to decide on a small selection of shortlisted entries worthy of being considered for the place of a Finalist and eventually a Winner. The process of having to critically look through so many images has certainly given me many useful insights, and so if you've ever entered or plan to enter a landscape image into a photo competition I hope you will find these tips helpful as you make your decision on what to enter!

1) Create an instant connection

The key to an amazing landscape photo is to make your viewer FEEL an instant connection to your image, whether that’s a feeling of wonder, shock, awe or some other emotion altogether. It’s pretty easy for us as photographers to take a shot of an amazing and recognisable location but it’s something quite different to take a shot of a very ordinary location that becomes extraordinary simply because of the photographer’s eye.

Some of the most compelling competition images are not shot at bucket-list locations. They’re shot:

On the roadside
In local hills
On familiar beaches
In weather most people avoid
In moments most people miss

The difference is both attention and intention.

A mere record of the scene says to the viewer: “This is what it looked like”, whereas a strong landscape image says: “Here is what it felt like to be there.”

Look at your image and ask yourself: “Would someone who has never been here still feel something when they see this?”

If the answer is yes, then you’ve created connection. And connection is what makes images memorable.

award winning image te mata peak fog — My Award-winning Landscape Category image - Sony Alpha Partner & Affiliate Awards 2025
A long exposure of fog rolling over Te Mata Peak during golden hour shot at 180mm (ISO 100 | f/9 | 13 seconds)

2) Create composition with depth

Creating an image that is multi-dimensional is another way to ensure your viewer’s attention is held. Rather than shooting at normal head height, why not shoot down low or from high above? Also think about whether you have included foreground interest or used other compositional techniques like leading lines, framing and symmetry, or objects that are at different depths of fields within your image to add more dimension.

Think in layers. Does your image have a foreground anchor, mid-ground structure and a background hero? Flat images rarely win awards.

passo delle erbe dolomite view — Gnarled roots make a distinct foreground with trees framing the background hero mountain at Passo delle Erbe, Dolomites (ISO 320 | f/11 | 1/40 sec)

3) Light it up - time & direction

There are scenes in nature that naturally demand our attention at any time of the day for their grandeur and beauty. But choosing the right moment to shoot these subjects can make all the difference. The light during the middle of the day is often harsh and flat especially in wide landscape scenes, whereas shooting early or late in the day provides opportunities for light and shadow to bring more depth to your subject on the ground, as well as a tendency for a richer contrast of tones if your image contains sky elements too.

It’s not just about time of day - think about the light direction too. Competition-level images almost always feature special light conditions, not just pretty scenery.

Look for:

Directional side light for texture and depth
Backlight for glow and atmosphere
Storm breaks and clearing weather
Mist, fog, snow, or dust catching light
First and last light of the day

This image below was a Top 3 Finalist in the Sony Alpha Awards Landscape Category for 2018.

mt taranaki reflection — Unusual side light and clouds during golden hour at Pouakai Tarn, Taranaki (ISO100 | f/22 | ¼ sec)

4) Work that lens

Most people see the world at roughly a “normal” focal length, i.e. around 35–50mm. It feels natural, familiar, and safe. But award-winning landscape images often don’t just look normal, they must feel powerful. One of the most effective creative choices you can make in the field is to deliberately step outside a normal field of view.

Go Wide (16–20mm) for immersion and vastness

Shooting at ultra-wide focal lengths allows you to create a sense of immersion that pulls the viewer into the landscape.

When used well, wide angles will:

Exaggerate foreground size and presence
Stretch leading lines for stronger visual flow
Emphasise distance between near and far elements

This works especially well when you get physically close to a foreground subject like rocks, flowers, ice, patterns, textures, while letting the background hero (mountain, sky, storm light) sit deeper in the frame.

Wide angle isn’t about fitting everything in, it’s about creating foreground drama.

Go Long (100mm+) for compression and scale illusion

On the other end of the spectrum, telephoto lenses are one of the most underused tools in landscape photography, but they are one of the most powerful. Long focal lengths compress distance. This means you can visually stack layers that are actually far apart, creating a heightened sense of density and scale.

Telephotos are brilliant for:

Layered mountain ranges
Fog and atmospheric depth
Repeating ridgelines
Isolating small subjects in vast terrain

Compression can make a landscape feel more immense, more graphic, and more intentional, rather than just wide.

When conditions are hazy, foggy, or dusty, it’s time to reach for the telephoto. Atmospheric layers + compression = award-level mood. I shot my award-winning Te Mata Peak image at the top of this post at 180mm.

Images taken at 24mm, 70mm, 168mm and 239mm all give a very different feel to this scene, with the strongest images being at the longest focal lengths on this particular morning.

5) Crop to concentrate & simplify

Award-winning images will combine a strong or unusual composition with interesting lighting to great effect without any distractions allowing the viewer to hone in on the main subject. Don’t be afraid to crop your image or remove distractions that draw the viewer’s eye away or cause it to wander, even if that means your final image is a smaller portion of the scene than what you originally shot.

Clutter kills impact. Award-winning images usually communicate one clear visual idea. Not five. Not ten. Just One.

Before pressing the shutter, ask:

What is my subject?
What supports it?
What distracts from it?

Simplify by:

Changing your angle
Zooming tighter
Lowering your camera height
Waiting for better conditions
Excluding messy edges

Cropping allows the iceberg and golden grease ice to be more prominent and removes the messy sky and patchy foreground. The edges of the cropped image have been deliberately chosen to better frame the scene.

Bonus Tip: Add a sense of mystery

Images that keep our attention the longest are often not the ones where the whole scene is well explained, leaving nothing to the imagination. Images where elements are hidden or unusual cause the viewer to pause and engage with your image as they try to work out what they are seeing. Using natural elements like fog and cloud or shooting a bird’s eye view are great ways to help create a sense of mystery, and ultimately the longer a viewer engages with the scene the more likely they are to feel that strong connection to your image.

ripples lake rotorua — Mist and ripples on Lake Rotorua (ISO 100 | f/8 | 1/250 sec)

Let questions live inside your frame

Some useful questions your image can provoke:

How big is this scene really?
Where does that path lead?
What’s hidden behind that ridge?
Is that fog or cloud or water?
What season is this?
What just happened, or is about to happen?

You don’t need to answer these questions visually. You just need to raise them.

The engagement advantage

From a judging and viewer-behaviour perspective, adding a sense mystery increases:

Viewing time
Emotional interpretation
Memorability
Personal projection (“my” meaning vs “the” meaning)

And that’s exactly what you want. Because the strongest images aren’t just seen, they’re there to be explored.

Leave a little unsaid. Leave a little unseen. Let the viewer step into the moment with you.

In conclusion

It's very tempting to enter images that are your personal favourites, but what is meaningful to you because of how you felt in that moment of capture may not be enough to hold the attention of a judge who wasn't able to experience the moment in real life the way you did.

Knowing how to bring the emotion of the moment into your image to enable others to imagine themselves there is key. Even if you aren't successful when submitting images in a competition, looking at your images with a critical eye is a really good way to see your images more objectively and to see where improvements could be made to the image, or to help you realise how you could choose to shoot a similar scene in a different and more compelling way next time.

COMPETITION RULES: DON'T FORGET TO CHECK THE TERMS & CONDITIONS FOR WHAT IS ALLOWED BEFORE YOU ENTER AN IMAGE AS THIS WILL DIFFER VASTLY ACROSS COMPETITIONS IN TERMS OF EDITING, CROPPING AND REMOVING DISTRACTIONS FROM THE SCENE (ESPECIALLY WHEN USING THE SOPHISTICATED AI TOOLS AVAILABLE NOW).