Mountain Photography
I enjoy the mountains because the beautiful landscape is a wonder gift to us from the Lord. Southern Arizona is not the best place to find the mountains that are extremely high and full of a rich forest. The best way to really see the mountains is on hiking trails and the back roads because I can get to much better scenery and formations.
Capturing the images
When out there looking for landscapes to photograph, I try to pick idea conditions in the sky, the lighting, and other factors. I will almost always use my full frame camera and the Canon 24-70 F/2.8 ii is the favorite. The canon 100-400 F/4-5.6 ii telephoto makes some very nice landscapes in the desert depending how the landscape is shaped. Although there is usually enough light I still prefer a tripod when framing a shot. Even when hiking I carry a small one in case it is needed.
Post Processing
I use Adobe Lightroom Classic and Photoshop to do my post processing. I spend most of the time in Lightroom Classic and move to Photoshop as needed. There are a few plugins I used to help in Photoshop which include Luminar 4 and Noiseware. I always use what is called a smart object in Photoshop before using filters so I can use a mask to only allow what was needed by the filter. I find that plugins do more than what is needed and the smart object controls that.