Landscape photography

Landscape photography is a field I've become more and more interested in lately. I've been reading a lot about it online and from the Digital Photography book by Scott Kelby (I love love love this book, as I have stated a few times before) and I've come to learn more about the importance of the composition. I've started to think about it more in general also, not just with landscapes. Often when I, an amateur photographer for two years now, take a landscape photo of something like a sunset, for example, I just have a horizontal photo with nothing in the foreground (the bottom of the photo), horizon and the (probably) colorful sky. They never have any kind of wow-factor and I haven't really figured out why. This has usually made me quite discouraged in pursuing landscape photography. But now I think I've figured out a big part of what has been wrong with my photos.

I've read a lot about the importance of the foreground in landscape photography and I've experienced a total change of heart with this field of photography. I feel inspired and I would just want to run out right now and find places to take photos of (but it's midnight at the moment, so I think I won't).

Here are a few links to some articles in dPS and LightStalking.com concerning the foreground in photography and landscape photography in general:

Pay attention to foregrounds

How to get foregrounds right in photography

Where to focus in landscape photography
Landscape photography for the serious amateur 

Here's a good example of what I mean when I say nothing in the foreground + horizon + the sky.
Not all that interesting. It's an okay panorama and all, but as a landscape photo, I've seen much much better.

Now here's when I really put some thought into this thing and ended up with, what I think is a much better photo when it comes to the "flow" and composition. And although I am a fan of sunbursts and lensflare, I'd want a GND filter to reduce those two a bit.

This is an old photo, but I think this has a good foreground too, although I don't remember having thought about it much at that moment. Otherwise the settings could've been better: for example the aperture is f2.7 when it's recommendable to have as small an aperture as possible (usually).