Tilt in an urban enviroment

[Ben R]

Many thanks to all. I am familiar with the basics of movements, I am trying to asertain if in the examples shown whether the vertical distance between focal points as would be caused by a tilt would be less than the horizontal distance.

In this diagram I've tried to show what I have in mind, the horizontal arrow shows the distance between near and far focus points without using tilt. Some 150 meters. If I tilt so that this horzontal distance is (more or less) the plane of focus then the vertical arrow shows my near and far focus points, i.e. I need the ground to the top of the wall in focus, some 8 meters. No doubt I'm being naive, I realise that the above is simplifying it immensely but I don't know how to draw 3D diagrams to show the wedge (a concept I understand), but technically should the above not make sense?



My friends, again these shots were taken as composition tryouts with a DSLR and a 50mm lens, I hope to get rather better squaring up of the verticals using rise than these snapshots!

I will be shooting 3 similar compositions this week with the LF rig (BTW why the heck doesn't my Gandolfi Varient have a focus lock down knob? I keep knocking the focusing bed and having to start again!) very similar problems, I'll let you know how it got on with photos, etc.

[David A. Goldfarb]

I think if you tilt in that composition to get the cobblestone road in focus, you'll lose the focus on the near top section of the wall on the left. You might swing from the near part of the wall on the left to the near part of the wall on the right to improve things a bit, but you would have to see if it's really helpful in practice.

Another thing to think about with this kind of scene is whether you want to be looking straight down the alleyway, but keep this kind of assymetric composition. You could do that by positioning the camera right in the middle of the road (traffic permitting) and using shift to adjust the composition (image circle permitting). I'd probably do it that way.

[steve simmons]

In my workshops I teach about three mantras and one of them is

The Ground Glass is Truth.

The only way to really know is to look through the gg. To hypothesize before hand, or afterwards as you are asking us to do, is not much more than speculation.

I always suggest one of the gg brighteners to help make the image easier to see on the gg.

All of that said, It is my best guess that in the above situation front tilt would have made the top of the wall on the left soft and smaller f=stops would have had a hard time bringing in that top section back into acceptable sharpness.

Acceptable sharpness is a subjective term and it would depend on how large the final print would be which brings in the issue of circles of confusion - this conversation can go down the road of math and pontification very quickly.

Sorry.

In 25 words or less, I would not have used front or rear tilt. I would have foccussed so that the near walkway (front and back standards perfectly vertical) and the far walkway areas were equally out of focus with the lens wide open. I would then put a 4x loupe on the gg and watched the image as I closed the lens down to smaller f-stops. You should be able to see when the DOF area has spread near and far to include these areas of the image.

steve simmons

[Ben R]

I'll let you know how I got on then!

[Ralph Barker]

Relating to your diagram, Ben, what I'd try is to make your near point on the foreground stone, and tilt slightly so the far point is near the top of the section of wall that juts out, or slightly higher. After stopping down, the bottom of the wedge (in theory) would get the paving stones sharp, and the top of the wedge would be above the near top of the wall.

Placing the focus plane on the walkway itself essentially wastes the bottom half of the wedge.

[steve simmons]

Barker's way is cumbersome and prone to failure. You are asking the DOF to do all its work behind the plane of focus that he is establishing and wasting the dof gain on the near side of the plane of focus. This will require a much smaller f-stop if it will work at all

By keeping your front and rear standard vertical, focussing so the near and far points or equally out of focus, then closing down and watching and using the dof gain in front of and behind the established plane of focus you will making the most efficient use of your dof and you won't need as small an f-stop.

I can't do the math, or pontificate about wedges, I just have 30+ years of real world experience with view cameras and architectural subjects.


steve simmons

[David A. Goldfarb]

I'm with Steve Simmons on this one. I don't think the thick end of the wedge is going to be thick enough to get the near cobblestones, the top of the near wall on the left, and the horizon all in focus, unless you stop down as much as you would using the normal DOF methods anyway. I rarely tilt for architectural subjects.

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Barker's way is cumbersome and prone to failure. You are asking the DOF to do all its work behind the plane of focus that he is establishing and wasting the dof gain on the near side of the plane of focus. This will require a much smaller f-stop if it will work at all

By keeping your front and rear standard vertical, focussing so the near and far points or equally out of focus, then closing down and watching and using the dof gain in front of and behind the established plane of focus you will making the most efficient use of your dof and you won't need as small an f-stop.

I can't do the math, or pontificate about wedges, I just have 30+ years of real world experience with view cameras and architectural subjects.


steve simmons

Why use a LF camera then? Other than film size, hassys have dof preview, some 35 mm cameras have them. This is why some people beleive using a LF camera is no different than using a fixed lens camera.

I cannot beleive that with your 30+ years experience you cannot offer not only ideas on movements that would require a lower f stop than what would be required if one dependedn only on dof and closing the lens, but that would also make this a photograph that was easily identifiable as taken with a VC by incorporating elements of composition with camera movements.

Ben, here is a nice little video on using the movements. If you look at the video, think of your "box" as the street. The near wall would be the side of the box closer to the lens and the opposite end at the far end of the street as the side of the box farther from the lens. Notice in the video he uses the front standard, if you instead use the back standard you will introduce distortion which gives you the capability of making a far more interesting shot, what IMO all of us LF photographers should strive for and the reason we use these cameras. WHat is the point of buying one of these cameras to use it as a dark box with no movements?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gR4m70xr9mE

[steve simmons]

I cannot beleive that with your 30+ years experience you cannot offer not only ideas on movements that would require a lower f stop than what would be required if one dependedn only on dof and closing the lens,

Even with a view camera some situations are straight ahead scenes and movements, other than rise and fall and shift to help select what part of the image circle to record on the film, can't help. This appears to be one of them.

Why use a view camera in this scene?

bigger piece of film
use of rise and fall to keep the vertical lines vertical and to move the image circle around on the film area to give you compositional choices


Apparently some previous posters here agree with me as well

steve simmons

[Jorge Gasteazoro]

Even with a view camera some situations are straight ahead scenes and movements

Well, I guess we disagree with this being one of those cases. Not only from the exposure point of view but from using the back tilt and swing to create a more striking photograph. If all the planes are parallel then we have no choice but to use dof and close the lens, clearly this is not the case.