Foreground Interest on a Galaxy: Add Depth to Landscapes

A strong foreground can go a long way in conveying scale and depth. Especially in expansive landscapes, mountains can look rather small on a tiny phone screen and the mid-ground can get compressed into a mere sliver of the frame.

The ultrawide camera on a Galaxy makes it easy to incorporate a strong foreground in your compositions, a fix for a view that can look mighty impressive when viewed in person, but can come out looking rather flat and unimpressive on a phone screen.

Why landscapes look flat on a phone

Flat landscapes are nearly always caused by one of a few different problems. It’s important to identify which one you’re running into because the solutions for each one are different.

• The land between you and the view is compressed to a narrow strip when you take the photo from eye level standing up.
• When there’s nothing in the near foreground there’s no visual cue for the viewer to understand scale and distance.
• When the near foreground is too small or distant it looks like junk at the bottom of the picture.
• Soft rocks in the foreground with the focus on the view. The inverse can happen too with a nice sharp foreground with a soft view behind it.
• The meter sees the bright sky and everything else in the photo is underexposed, including the foreground, making it look muddy and dark.

According to Nikon, both the foreground and background can be used creatively to add depth to your images as well as to direct where people look when viewing your pictures.

The following sections address each cause in order, beginning with how you position your phone.

Get low and close to the foreground

Try holding your phone lower (knee height or below) instead of eye level. The ground falls away much quicker at eye level, so objects close to you appear smaller than they would if you held your phone lower – notice how the rock in the foreground (which is only about a metre from the lens) would appear a lot smaller from an eye level shot, while the mountains in the background would remain pretty much the same size.

Get close – about a metre to 30cm away works well with an ultrawide to fill the bottom of the frame without getting in the way of your vista.

If you need to get even closer to the ground with your phone’s camera lens, hold your phone upside down and use a volume button or voice command to take the photo so you don’t have to stretch to get to the screen.

Choose the lens for the distance

Galaxy phones have lenses that are best suited to different distances between you and your foreground subject. According to GSMArena, recent S-series Galaxy phones have had an ultrawide that equates to about 13mm (with a 120-degree angle of view), a main camera with a focal length of 23 to 24mm, and telephoto cameras at 67mm and 111mm.

Although the most dramatic effect will generally be had using an ultrawide lens, a fence traversing a field shot on the 3x telephoto can provide a more reserved foreground interest, particularly in situations where it is the background that is the true star of the show. See our depth guide for a more detailed discussion of layering.

Focus where it counts

Since phones have short focal lengths and tiny image sensors, most of the frame will be in focus, but if the foreground subject is very close, you may still find the background out of focus. That said, there are ways to improve things. Wikipedia’s article on hyperfocal distance describes one technique: aim your focus point a bit beyond the subject closest to you to extend the depth of field as far as possible.

On the Galaxy S25 Ultra and Galaxy S26 Ultra, the ultrawide camera also has phase-detection autofocus according to GSMArena’s spec sheets. On the base Galaxy S25 or midrange Galaxy A56 and Galaxy A57, it doesn’t, so you may need to move the foreground object farther away to get everything in focus.

If you want more control, you can enable manual focus in Pro mode and move the focus bar yourself (via Samsung). Again, it’s best to set it just beyond the closest object. Zoom into the preview to make sure everything from front to back is sharp. The hyperfocal distance explainer describes the theoretical background.

For extremely close-up shots, note that GSMArena measured the Galaxy S26 Ultra’s and Galaxy S25 Ultra’s main cameras can focus as close as 18cm and 8cm, respectively. Closer than that and you’ll need to enable the Focus enhancer (via Samsung), which is indicated by the flower icon in the viewfinder and switches to the ultrawide camera to take macro shots.

Balance a bright sky and a dark foreground

In Samsung’s own advice for the S26 in its online user guide, you can also touch and hold an area to set the focus point, say on the rocks, and then the AF/AE frame will separate so you can move the exposure frame to another area, say the brighter sunset sky, to set the exposure.

The rocks will be exposed darker than you saw them, but that’s easier to correct afterwards than a sky that’s been exposed too brightly and lost lots of colour and detail. You can also use the exposure monitor in Pro mode on the Galaxy S26, which will highlight any overexposed areas so you can dial down the EV setting until it’s no longer flagging up the sky. The HDR guide explains what Photo mode does automatically in these scenes.

Composing a foreground shot

1. 1

   Pick the background subject first

   Consider the subject of your photo, and pick a suitable foreground accordingly. For example, the foreground for a shot of a mountain peak at sunset might be quite different from that of a city skyline.

2. 2

   Find a foreground within a metre or two

   Scan the ground in front of you and look for a subject that complements the scene. Curves in the foreground reflect curves in the background (for example, a curving beach in front of a rounded mountain), and bold colours and textures are eye-catching.

3. 3

   Get low and close

   Lower your phone until the foreground occupies about the bottom third of the frame and the scene takes up the other two-thirds.

4. 4

   Keep a gap between near and far

   Avoid letting the foreground and the subject touch or overlap because they visually merge into one shape.

5. 5

   Set focus and exposure

   Tap on the foreground to focus there, and then adjust the exposure using the AF/AE split feature or the exposure control until you’re happy with the brightness in the sky.

6. 6

   Try a vertical frame

   Try holding your phone in portrait orientation for a few shots. This gives more room to the foreground since the horizon will sit higher in the frame.

Editing the foreground

Start with Highlights in the Tone menu in Samsung Gallery. Drag it down to restore colour to the sky. Next, nudge up Exposure to lighten the ground and Contrast to give the rocks and tree trunks a bit more texture. Be careful not to push Contrast too far, though, because you can end up with very dark shadows.

Snapseed’s Brush tool has Exposure and Dodge & Burn effects that can be used to add brightness to the foreground without affecting the sky. There’s also a Shadows slider in Tune Image, which Snapseed’s help page explains will lighten or darken shadow areas only – handy if you’re dealing with a dark foreground. Plus, you don’t need a subscription to use Snapseed.

Foreground mistakes to avoid

• Foregrounds can be distracting if they are too busy (eg grass can get messy and distract from your shot)
• Don’t cut your foreground in half at the edge of your photo as it will take attention away from the rest of your photo
• People towards the edge of the frame, especially on an ultrawide as distortion can occur (according to Samsung’s guide)
• Make sure your horizon isn’t skewed, which can be easy to forget about, especially if your phone is down low (you can use the level in Composition guide to help)
• Clean your lens, because if you’re getting down low to capture grass, for example, you’re more likely to get fingerprints on the lens

You can put foreground lines to work in more than one way, as our leading lines guide indicates, and our 15 leading lines ideas provide some good practice scenes. For more landscape settings, look at our landscape guide.