Focal length comparison

I recently picked up an 85L and 135L and thought that this would be a cool comparison of them and my other primes. I tried to keep the same perspective and framing with the change of each focal length. As noted, all lenses were at f/2 and were shot on my 5D2. Lens correction profile has been enabled for each lens in LR. Test subject is my ~450hp 1991 Audi 200.

Nice comparison. Gotta love the compression from the longer lens

Really wish I had a 200 f/2 on hand to add! lol

Nice comparison indeed.

To longer the lens, the less sporty your car gets

With the 35mm, did you shoot more down from the ground up ... or did you keep approx the same hight across the different lenses?

bipodsnapster wrote in post #14302324
Nice comparison indeed.

To longer the lens, the less sporty your car gets

With the 35mm, did you shoot more down from the ground up ... or did you keep approx the same hight across the different lenses?

Haha, the car was never intended to look sporty anyway. I love the thing though, such a sleeper with the modifications I've done to it.

Another pic of it for fun:

Those older Audi's are great cars ... had one myself long time ago

No critique, I know this is for fun and a very nice time spent on your hobby.

But you should have brought your tripod ;-P

Two things for me ... I always love the dramatic a wide angel lens can add when framing a car. But of course with the longer lens and bokeh, your car looks more isolated and clearer in the pic.

1 and 4 are best Amazing you own all these lenses.

amd is the best wrote in post #14302311
I recently picked up an 85L and 135L and thought that this would be a cool comparison of them and my other primes. I tried to keep the same perspective and framing with the change of each focal length.

The only way to keep the same perspective (relative sizes of objects in the scene that are at different distances from the camera (or the viewer's eye) is to keep the camera at the same physical position for all of the shots.

The images in the original post have radically different perspective because the camera was moved. Look at sizes of the objects in the background (the truck in the first two images or the individual trees in all four images) as compared to the size of the front surface of the car.

Please read our "sticky" (found in the General Photography Talk forum) tutorial titled Perspective Control in Images - Focal Length or Distance?.

kin2son wrote in post #14302318
Nice comparison. Gotta love the compression from the longer lens

The focal length of the lens had nothing to do with the "compression" in the image. It was the different distances between the camera and the front of the car that made the change in perspective (the "compression" change as the longer focal lengths were used) happen.

Please read our "sticky" (found in the General Photography Talk forum) tutorial titled Perspective Control in Images - Focal Length or Distance?.

this is the first time i understood what compression is. thanks.
longer length compresses it so much, the grandeur is gone. i wonder what it does to faces

nitish wrote in post #14302585
this is the first time i understood what compression is. thanks.
longer length compresses it so much, the grandeur is gone. i wonder what it does to faces

You've misunderstood what you are seeing.

Each time a longer focal length was used in the series of shots in the original post, the camera was moved further from the car. It's the distance that changes the "compression" (perspective) not the focal length.

A longer focal length allows a tighter framing from a longer distance, but a longer focal length by itself does not do any "compression".

good to see these comparisons. For me the 135mm is a more pleasing result.

Paul

SkipD wrote in post #14302471
The only way to keep the same perspective (relative sizes of objects in the scene that are at different distances from the camera (or the viewer's eye) is to keep the camera at the same physical position for all of the shots.

The images in the original post have radically different perspective because the camera was moved. Look at sizes of the objects in the background (the truck in the first two images or the individual trees in all four images) as compared to the size of the front surface of the car.

Please read our "sticky" (found in the General Photography Talk forum) tutorial titled Perspective Control in Images - Focal Length or Distance?.

I believe that maybe I just used the wrong wording in my description. Would framing be correct? I wanted the car to take up the as close to the same amount of the frame in each picture as possible.

I'll be sure to read the sticky.

P4ulG wrote in post #14303230
good to see these comparisons. For me the 135mm is a more pleasing result.

Paul

Thanks Paul. I tend to agree with you and enjoy the longer focal lengths.

amd is the best wrote in post #14303293
I believe that maybe I just used the wrong working in my description. Would framing be correct? I wanted the car to take up the as close to the same amount of the frame in each picture as possible.

Yep. What you did was keeping the framing of the foreground subject pretty close to the same.

However, by moving the camera you changed the perspective in each image.

I love SkipD's persistence in explaining perspective.....it's almost like he can sniff out the topics that need some explainin' done

amd is the best wrote in post #14302311
I recently picked up an 85L and 135L and thought that this would be a cool comparison of them and my other primes. I tried to keep the same perspective and framing with the change of each focal length. .

To be precise, the 'perspective' (relationship of main subject to its surroundings) was altered by changing the camera position for each shot, the 'subject framing' was kept constant in all the photos by changing the camera position to suit the FL being used for each shot.

I see that my Sticky colleague SkipD has already brought this up. Nice illustration of this principle, OP...we're here to fix the terminology used ! I've been trying to convince him to coauthor another Sticky, on the topic of DOF and the many variables behind this, out-of-focus background blur amount and the variables behind this, and 'bokeh' quality...THREE different but related concepts.