unnatural perspective

[Jack Dahlgren]

[QUOTE=J. E. Brown;617626]Good discussion here. To add to it:

Is there a priority of when you should use rise/fall versus vertical shift with film/lens planes to keep things square? Does it depend on the scenario you are faced with?QUOTE]

Rise and Fall are the same as "vertical shift". Typically shift refers to horizontal movement and rise and fall are vertical.

Rise, fall and shift are all planar to the lens board.

[EdWorkman]

When one looks at a building one knows that it has vertical faces [assuming a regular bldg blah blah, -a box] When one looks at a picture of that building made by tilting the camera-expecially using a wider view lens -it looks like the building is pointy or falling backward. But assuming the same viewing point the perspective is exactly the same. So unless you are depicting a Frank Gehry creation, minimize the convergence or we'll assume you took the picture with your phone, or worse, or make it reeeeeeeeally artsy.

[EdWorkman]

expecially ?????

[Toyon]

Andreas Feininger said that you should correct about 70% of converging verticals, otherwise it looks unnatural.

[StevenJohn]

EdWorkman-
One also knows that lines converge at infinity from the viewer. Railroad tracks converge to a point on the horizon, but we know they are a constant width apart. This is why, in my opinion, I think perfectly vertical lines on a tall building looks unnatural.

[EdWorkman]

Yahbut- when you look at a box building you, or most people, don't think it's pointy or falling over backward, as your brain should compensate and tell you that the building is just fine. On a 2D print your brain sees triangles, and then should ask "what the heck happened to the building?" Note I didn't say "perfectly" vertical or parallel, I said minimize convergence. Sure if you are really close to a really tall building a little convergence is okay. If you are looking at a 4 story building not very much convergence is NOT okay, make it almost none. Above, Architects were mentioned- I am a Structural Engineer and am familiar with buildings- I about puked when the Orange County Register published a "phone" picture of a UCI bldg I participated in- supposedly a documentary photo but it totally destroyed information about the structure.
Like I also said , if you wanna destroy reality, do it thoroughly so it's "art" and can't be confused with the portrayal of a building as a building. But hey, no reason for you not to do what you want to, and if you make it look like it's falling backward, I'll laugh and point.

[StevenJohn]

Hi Ed,

I'm an engineer too, but a little different strain (ME).

I mostly agree. A four story building wouldn't show much convergence if you were standing a little ways away from the building. Now if I were standing a foot away from the base of the building and looking up, I would expect to see just a little convergence. This is of course exaggerated with wide angle lenses.

Another example would be a skyscraper. Taking a picture of the TransAtlantic building from across the bay, it should appear vertical. Stand at the base and shoot up, and it would converge.

What determines the convergence is where you're looking to make your infinite point. If you're across the bay and making the horizon your infinite point, the skyscraper's vertical lines should be parallel and vertical. If you're standing close to the skyscraper, looking up, and making the top of the building (or a projected point in the sky beyond the building) a infinite point, then the vertical lines of the building would start to converge on the infinite point.

I guess what I see as being unnatural isn't just a non-converging building, but a non-converging building when it should converge...a closely shot wide angle looking up.

[StevenJohn]

Actually, one of the most impressive optical illusions I ever saw was aided by convergence. I once stood under the St. Louis Arch and looked up. Clouds were passing overhead parallel with the two legs of the arch. The arch thins at the top, but with the convergence and clouds passing over, it made the arch appear to be falling over.

[Robert Hughes]

with the convergence and clouds passing over, it made the arch appear to be falling over.

I've noticed that too on the St Louis Arch, also the Sears Building in Chicago. I get a feeling similar to that nauseated loss of balance I feel standing on a cliff edge.

[John Rice]

Like I also said , if you wanna destroy reality, do it thoroughly so it's "art" and can't be confused with the portrayal of a building as a building. But hey, no reason for you not to do what you want to, and if you make it look like it's falling backward, I'll laugh and point.

That's my general approach. I've shot a lot of Architecture and I always strove to get verticals absolutely correct, except when they were far from correct. I have always viewed slightly off verticals as sloppy work. Having said that, there is more to it. The problem I see an awful lot, especially with house exteriors in the newspaper is that the photographer used too short a lens and typically shot the house from the sidewalk on the same side of the street as the house. This looks awful and unnatural to me. It does make the house look "big" because it is looming over you, but I still think it looks awful.

If you shoot the building from the right location, you can keep verticals correct and have it look great. This might not include extremely tall buildings. But I believe any architectural subject can be photographed best with verticals correct, so long as all other aspect are handled well. Too many photographers get wrapped up in the ability of the camera to correct verticals without thinking beyond that.