The following is a direct copy and has been Pasted in for future reference from the Art of Photography coursework PDF Doc. (pasted in Maroon)
2 or more photographs
Used from the same place, different lenses give different views. But if you change your viewpoint as you change the lens, you can make a difference in the perspective. You need one wide-angle lens and one telephoto. The bigger the difference between their focal lengths, the more dramatic will be the result. If you have a zoom lens instead, do the exercise with the zoom control at its shortest and longest settings. Find a scene that has enough space in front of it to allow you a choice of viewpoint, from near to far. Avoid a flat subject; it must have some depth – a building will do, or a person in a setting. Start with the telephoto lens and make a tightly framed composition that is, with the subject filling the frame. Study the view through the viewfinder very carefully, and remember the limits at the edges of the frame. Take your shot. Change lenses to the wide-angle. Then, in a straight line, walk forward, looking through the viewfinder until the same subject fills the frame. Take the second shot. Compare the results. The differences between your two images will depend on the focal lengths that you used. Very wide angle lenses and a long telephoto will, for example, produce images with very different perspectives. Write down how your two photographs vary in character. What impression does each give about the distance of the viewer from the scene, and about the distance between parts of the scene itself? Study the images below which go further into the implications of focal length. When you look at scenes for any potential photograph, think in terms of a ‘wide-angle shot’ or a ‘telephoto’ shot.
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Equipment
Nikon D4
14/24 lens
24/70 lens
80/400 lens
Tripod
Method & Approach
In this exercise I wanted a subject large enough to initially frame with my trusty go everywhere 24/70, then after walking in a straight line change to my 14/24 wide angle. Please see pictures 1 & 2 shown below.
To further prove the effect of differing lens characteristics, I chose a subject (my daughter) who I then photographed keeping her a constant size within the frame. The pictures and captions below show the distant and compressive effects according to lens choice. Please see pictures 3, 4 and 5 for a visual understanding – shown below.
Pictures taken of Witney Church (Oxfordshire).
Note – all pictures have been compressed hence there will be a quality reduction when enlarging.
Picture 1 – Picture taken with the 24/70 lens, with the focal length of 30mm. In this shot the cars look like they are parked very tight and the church looks compressed.
Picture 2 – To capture this picture I moved closer from the above image by 70 meters. The picture was taken with a 14/24 wide angle with a focal length of 14mm. It is vastly different in character but is of identical subjects. In this shot the cars look much further apart and the angles of the church and surrounding buildings are no longer vertical, the tree looks like it is about to fall over and the church also looks like it is leaning back compared to the first picture.
Picture 3 – Picture taken with the 14/24 lens, with the focal length set to 14mm. In this shot the church looks very distant in comparison with the other two pictures below.
Picture 4 – This picture was taken with the 24/70 and a focal length of 70mm. The church has much more visual detail at this focal length – note that the church is now closer and the spire has been cut off.
Picture 5 – In this picture I used an 80/400 lens with the focal length set to 130mm. Here we can see the church in the background has been brought right forward (compressed), to the point of it no longer being recognisable in comparison to the first image taken with the wide angle.
What have I learnt from this exercise
From this exercise I have learnt that pictures taken with a wide angle lens often distort parts of the picture, especially at the outer most edges of the frame.
I have also learnt that pictures taken with a telephoto lens have a tendency to bring the background closer to the subject i.e. compress objects in the image.
My Reflection
This has been a good exercise, quite often you see this experiment and the explanation of lens characteristics in books but until you try it for yourself …… it won’t fully sink in.
stingray493 