Wide angle
All to often (almost always) my wide angle shots come out really really boring. I think it is much harder to shoot wide angle than neatly framed subjects as in portraits, action, wildlife, etc. Even panoramas are easier for me (though subject to the some of the same pitfalls.) Shooting with the wide angle lens is like playing jazz if you've only been taught to play classical.
I'll bet I'm not the only one with this problem. So I thought I'd start a critique thread on the subject so that those with the ability can help those with the need.
My best success with the wide angle lens came about a week ago after spending a few days shooting typically bad shots. I thought about it beforehand and decided that the views along the river might be good for wide angle. I posted some of them, but got no feedback, probably because I didn't ask for feedback and they aren't really good enough for praise. So I'm trying again. How can I take better wide angle shots.
Here are some of my best to date:
I'll bet I'm not the only one with this problem. So I thought I'd start a critique thread on the subject so that those with the ability can help those with the need.
My best success with the wide angle lens came about a week ago after spending a few days shooting typically bad shots. I thought about it beforehand and decided that the views along the river might be good for wide angle. I posted some of them, but got no feedback, probably because I didn't ask for feedback and they aren't really good enough for praise. So I'm trying again. How can I take better wide angle shots.
Here are some of my best to date:
If not now, when?
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Comments
So straight up wasn't very exciting. I tried one ala Rubber Soul:
This last one had technical problems with exposure and focus (it was getting dark.) Perhaps I should have used the on-camera flash? But the composition isn't so boring. Or is it?
Lynn
Dave
http://www.lifekapptured.com (gallery)
John, I think of real wide angle lenses - (say < 35 mm focal length in 35mm full frame systems ) as being most useful to emphasize the foreground or a strong central element of interest in the foreground, at the expence of the background, or to lead the eye from the foreground to a strong background element. Several of your images seem to lack the strong foreground element. Your picture of the kids shot from the ground I think is the best for this reason - The foreground is the image of the three kids. The diagonal helps too.
One of my shots that I think best demonstrates the use of a wide angle - and one I deliberately chose for the foreground emphasis is the deer tracks across Nevins Bridge. I wanted to emphasize the deer tracks and make sure the viewer got the message - so I deliberately used the 17 mm to focus the viewers attention on the foreground tracks in the snow. A standard lens would not have done this near as well in my opinion. To me this is the essence of wide angle usage. But I agree that it is difficult to do this routinely.
John Shaw says that very small changes of position of wide angles make the composition change greatly - AND frequently leads to stuff unanticipated in the edge of photos shot with wide angles. I think he is dead on - Wide angles can be improved with tripod usage to allow carefull checking of the edges of the frame - but most of us do not do that since wide angles tolerate slow shutter speeds so well.
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
I tried to get this effect with the views of the factory across the river and with the people leaning over the river. But I think I did the opposite of what you did. I tried to use foreground elements to frame or set off a subject in the background.
If you just strap the wide angle lens on and go out to shoot, you really have to screw your head on differently (as opposed to using it for just appropriate shots.) I often hear that professional photojournalists like ultra wide zooms and it always suprises me. It shows a kind of "chops" that are a little hard to fathom (to beat my jazz anology to death.)
A another horizontal shot of mine - not as good as the deer tracks - (I thought it was cool to see that the deer use the bridges too )-- the basket leads the eye into the frame to the people stuffing the balloon into the nylon bag - also there is a nice diagonal line from the basket to the black balloon to the people
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
The camera was almost to the ground for the deer tracks. I was on my knees crawling around in the snow. Somewhere I saw a photo workshop and one of the things they recommended to bring was kneepads
Another shot of a historical marker sign - I collect these - I'm wierd of course - And I chose to take this way, to de-emphasize the mountains in the background while I center the attention on the sign - I could have the sign the same size with a telephoto, but then the mountains would loom much larger and take attention away from the sign.
John - I was thinking about your people leaning over the river - the secret to using W-Angles is that you HAVE to be CLOSE. Some people say wide angle zooms are not as good as wide angle primes, because wide angle primes allow much closer focusing. I think if you had been 1/3 of the distance to the people in your picture of the river it might have had more going for it. I think the distance from your subjects confuses the eye as to what is the center of interest.
Wide angles are to be used 1- 3 feet from the subject - up close and in your face....... Takes a different midset like you said. Just my two cents worth....
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
Both copyright The New York Times 2004
Berenice Abbott: CHANGING NEW YORK 1935-1938, Pine Street: U.S. Treasury in background; near Nassau Street. Mar. 26, 1936.
Second: I love wide angles. I'm still shooting with a lowly G3. It has a wide angle attachment. I love it and I use it a lot. I don't go through a conscious analysis of the kind described by Pathfinder. But I agree about having a strong foreground. I love filling the frame, getting something strong in the foreground.
Shooting last weekend was a perfect example. I went down to the park hoping to get hats. When I saw people, the only way to get everything I wanted into the picture, was to widen the frame. I really enjoy getting the camera as close as I can - for me, it makes for an arresting image. So I got these two.
You can see the similarities. You can see I'm trying to jam something as close as I can.
The other time I use the wide angle is to get an entire building, or scene, into the frame. If the normal lens is cutting off some of what I want, I'll stick the wide angle on. Here's another example from the same evening. I always like how the wide angle can take a foreground and stretch it into the rest of the shot, sort of taking your eye with it. Not a particularly good shot (in fact, I cropped it!) but I wanted to get the water in the foreground, as well as the towers and the sky.
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam
http://www.mcneel.com/users/jb/foghorn/ill_shut_up.au
But if I did wander around with just the wide angle, I'd be shoving it as close to things as I could, to get a strong foreground, then let the backgroud spread out like a backdrop. As I say, I think they're tons of fun!
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam
http://www.mcneel.com/users/jb/foghorn/ill_shut_up.au
As to the photos above - the band in front of the ship may qualify as the use of a wide angle as necessitated by the short distance available to the photog
The second image of the ship in the water off New York looks to my eye like a telephoto with compression of the near-far distances typical of teles - DO we know the focal length of the lens used here ?
The image by Ansel Adams I'll bet is a normal focal length for a large format camera - 8x10 perhaps? Anything shorter than 200 mm might be wide angle here, but the image to my eye looks more like a normal focal length lens.
The last image is almost certainly a view camera utilizing tilt and shift to maintain depth of field and perspective - I am not sure of the focal length here.
OH Rutt - I also apparently misrepresented one picture as wide angle
This was actually shot at 75mm - goes to show how hard this is to keep this all straight. My mistake about focal length here - But the next image here was shot at 17mm - Like you are saying - sometimes you need a wide angle just because you - the photographer - cannot back up and encompass the scene without a wide angle of view But one reason it works it that it is a simple graphic image without a lot high frequency detail - just a fire and some colored nylon.
Some wide angle shots are easy to pick out and some are not so obvious.
In John Shaw's Nature Photography Field Guide he states " These lenses' wide angles of view make it easy to include TOO MUCH in one photo. If you fit all you can in one shot, you'll end up with a mass of chaotic information, and your viewer won't be able to figure out what you wanted them to view. To make an effective photograph, you have to impose order on chaos...... Wide angles demand that you work carefully and selectively, since even a small change in location shift's the photo's emphasis to a different part of the foreground. "
This is why I said to get up close and personal - it simpifies your job and that of your viewer in identifying what is most important. Like I said - YMMV - just my two cents.
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
As long as I've been taking pictures, I've loved shooting wide angle. There is no better tool for showing a subject in its surroundings. It can be used near or far. In close the subject dominates its surroundings, appearing larger than it normally would. From a distance, the opposite happens; the subject starts to appear small in relation to its surroundings. Sometimes it can be a little bit of both:
A scan of one of my old slides. Not sure of the film, Nikon N90, 24mm f/2.8 Nikkor
I can't wait for the day when Nikon has a full-frame dSLR (and I can afford it
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam
http://www.mcneel.com/users/jb/foghorn/ill_shut_up.au
Moderator of the Technique Forum and Finishing School on Dgrin
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam
http://www.mcneel.com/users/jb/foghorn/ill_shut_up.au
I find that wide angle does nothing for me when shooting a landscape.
I like to use the lens to accentuate angles.
In any case and for me, wide angle == close in shot.
Not one of the best but these are just outside my office window.
Taken with a Nikon CoolPix 950 and a fisheye lens.
Just noticed this thread. I happened to take a couple of shots last weekend that fit this to a tee and need some critique. I read an article somewhere on wide angle photography that really had some good tips. Unfortunately, due to advancing age and 1/2 Timers, I can't recall where it was. Anyway.......
Both shots were taken from the same location and have not been cropped.
The first...
This image has one of the problems I have with all the images I take. I does not reflect what I wanted to capture in the picture. It was not a very colorfull sunset, so the sky is kind of BLAH! That issue is for another thread however.
The second captures a little more of what I wanted.
I like the second much better and I think it is a better wide angle shot. Including more of the foreground and camera orientation, make this a better image????
Wade in with your thoughts.
Hutch
I prefer the horizontal. The vertical is nice, but the branches in the upper right corner seem to come from no where, and to me they're a bit distracting. If more of the tree was in the frame (like in the horizontal) it would probably work better.
I think with a bit of the sky cropped out of the horizontal image, the water and shore line would get more emphasis and the image would be stronger. Other than that, bump up the saturation a little and I think that would be a great picture.
Thanks, for the quick comments. I may try to crop both shots to see which one I like better. I did not crop either to show how very little change in framing can really alter the image the camera "sees".
Someday I hope to be at least technically adequate with my photography. I know I will never be the artist that some of the rest of you are!
Based on inspiration from Andy, who is truely an artist, I made some changes to the vertical image.
I like the color in this one much better.
Andy is the KING!
Hutch
Ian
I really like that image. Nice!
Hutch
sorry don't have the time to find and post some examples now. will try in future.
Catapultam habeo. Nisi pecuniam omnem mihi dabis, ad caput tuum saxum immane mittam
http://www.mcneel.com/users/jb/foghorn/ill_shut_up.au
I started off with a correction in RGB: I used curves and changed only the red curve:
(Notice that I have the scale along the bottom going from light to dark, which is not the default. You change this by clicking in the middle of the scale where the two arrows are.)
And here is the result of this move:
So I brought up the red in the highlights to make the sky and water pinker. The curve is carefully written to limit its impact on the rest of the image.
But I want more pop from the image. The sky should be more dramatic, but in particular, I want the foliage on the right to have the look of things at dawn and dusk where the light makes the colors stand out like stained glass. So I moved to LAB and steepened the A and B curves. I've written about this a lot in my posts, but I'm not sure if everyone knows what I mean. So here are the curves:
As you can see, these are just about the simplest curve adjustments you can imagine. But as Dan Margulis likes to say, "a straight line is also a curve."
Here is the result of this move:
The difference from the LAB move is a little subtle. But try steeper curves and you'll see that you can make it gets more dramatic very quickly. LAB curves are an incredibly powerful tool and small changes to the curves can have a profound impact on the image.