What is the best time of day to shoot landscape or building?

[CameraClicker]

These are cell phone photos, cropped, resized and sharpened. In hard light.
This was mid-afternoon


This was after dinner, around 8:00 p.m., at a local mall


This one was on a cloudy day, at a new mall near Oakville, in the middle of the day. It still has hard light.

 

[petrochemist115 140]

The best light is usually at a time I can't be at the location!
This seems to apply even if I get out early for the sunrise golden hour - it will be clouded over, and raining

As many have said above the right light will depend on the subject.
Some will be better lit from the east others from the west or occationally straight above.
Some benefit from harsh lighting, exaggerating details, but for many a more diffuse light will be kinder to the subject.
Golden & Blue hours often give excellent results but don't suit everywhere.

 

[CameraClicker]

I usually like to shoot in very early in the morning, because less distractions form cars and people, and I get less hard light and shadow. Sometimes, I like to shoot under the cloudy day. Thought?

Hmm, I would say I DONT like shooting on cloudy days.

I agree with what everyone else said as far as "it depends" on a lot of other factors / situation and what you are trying to do.


So if you like cloudy days, are you telling me that you like photo 1 better than photo 2?

I went back to this house specifically to reshoot the exterior during a better time of day. At least I think the second is better.

The first one has better grass, but the house is mostly in shadow with bright light on the sides. It has better colour generally. The sky seems to have high thin cloud that just registers as grey. The second has a great sky but the colour of the house and trees is flatter. They both have some appeal, but the one with good sky can be adjusted more easily because the house is in even light.

 

[Tailgunner]

Whenever the shot you want comes together is "the best" time. That might vary from building to building; some buildings face east,some west,some north, and some buildings face south. Some are shaded early, some late. There is no, one,single best time for buildings as a whole. Cloudy days might be ideal, for some shots; other shots might look better with a good, deep, solid shadow for a three-dimensional effect. It just depends on what the shot is supposed to look like and what the building's physical location is like.

This^

I was going to say, where do I start. It all depends on what you're looking for in a shot and then scouting out the location. Keep in mind, if your plan on an afternoon golden hour shot, traffic to and from your chosen location could be very congested. I once had to wait 3-4 months to take a cityscape shot due to the daylight savings time change. The sunsets sooner when you fall back thus making it difficult for me to my site through rush hour traffic. Morning shots are about the same but in reverse, it's easy for me to get out of the city early hours but I'm going with the traffic depending on the time of year. You also sometimes have to take in account for seasons, the building my have tress or foliage that drops leaves during the fall for example.

It sounds like a pain but the beauty of it all is you can generally find a verity of different ways to shoot a location.

 

[WayneF]

I usually like to shoot in very early in the morning, because less distractions form cars and people, and I get less hard light and shadow. Sometimes, I like to shoot under the cloudy day. Thought?

Hmm, I would say I DONT like shooting on cloudy days.

I agree with what everyone else said as far as "it depends" on a lot of other factors / situation and what you are trying to do.


So if you like cloudy days, are you telling me that you like photo 1 better than photo 2?



1. 6826-SP-3MLSJPG by linktheworld219, on Flickr



2. RE-1-4 by linktheworld219, on Flickr


I went back to this house specifically to reshoot the exterior during a better time of day. At least I think the second is better.

I just could not resist, the error was so blatant. Here are the same pictures, simply with the White Balance adjusted.

Now the top one is corrected better, not blue like it was left before, but more like it should have been done.
And now the bottom one is intentionally blue (like the first was left before),

Now which one do you like better? These pictures are different situations, the mixed lighting (full sun on background trees) is a problem, and the clouds are scenic and should be pretty, but proper white balance is the photographers job. The photographer chose the situations, but did not do his white balance work. We can place blame on something other than the cloudy day.