Trouble capturing the scale

I took this shot recently and was relatively happy with how it came out except that it does a poor job capturing the sense of scale. Looking at the picture without reference I would think that the falls are ~20ft high, but in fact it's closer to a 90ft drop. The only way I could think of the establish the scale would be to have some reference object, say a person, standing near the falls but I didn't want any people in the shot and I wasn't sure how safe if was getting too close. I was standing about as far back as I could get without getting a ton of people in the shot, and even without the people there wasn't much room to move back. Also, the photo is taken at 16mm. Any suggestions?

I think it is the lack of visibility from the rock ledge in the near foreground back to the waterfall. Missing the pool of water that I assume is there is playing a bit of a trick of perspective making the falls look smaller. Bringing the camera up a couple feet to get a glimpse of that would probably have helped. Awesome shot all the same, I've been studying waterfall shots lately in prep for a trip to Oregon next month.

cuda2k wrote in post #17047940
I think it is the lack of visibility from the rock ledge in the near foreground back to the waterfall. Missing the pool of water that I assume is there is playing a bit of a trick of perspective making the falls look smaller. Bringing the camera up a couple feet to get a glimpse of that would probably have helped.

was going to say the exact same thing.

if that isn't possible, try to get a tree in the scene. cool shot, did you use a ND filter?

Wide angle/prespective distortion (close things appear larger, far things appear smaller) accentuated by the lack of real visual information on how far away the falls are, we only catch a glimpse of the pool on the right. Also the rocks on the left and the shapes of the rocks give the illusion that foreground and the falls are a lot closer to each other than they actually are.

lilkngster wrote in post #17048099
Wide angle/prespective distortion (close things appear larger, far things appear smaller) accentuated by the lack of real visual information on how far away the falls are, we only catch a glimpse of the pool on the right. Also the rocks on the left and the shapes of the rocks give the illusion that foreground and the falls are a lot closer to each other than they actually are.

Also the crop factor even though not square doesn't aid in the ht on this shot. Try cropping a little off the right and even more off the right. Kinda the idea behind panos. long photos give the illusion of long horizons just by eliminating the negative space around them. Same here to an extent. narrow it and it appears taller.

Vmann wrote in post #17048876
Also the crop factor even though not square doesn't aid in the ht on this shot. Try cropping a little off the right and even more off the right. Kinda the idea behind panos. long photos give the illusion of long horizons just by eliminating the negative space around them. Same here to an extent. narrow it and it appears taller.

Nice!

The classic way of giving perspective in a pic like this is to get something in the very near foreground and make it very sharp. Wide angle, something in the foreground, and the background will gain perspective and the picture have excellent depth.

cuda2k wrote in post #17047940
I think it is the lack of visibility from the rock ledge in the near foreground back to the waterfall. Missing the pool of water that I assume is there is playing a bit of a trick of perspective making the falls look smaller. Bringing the camera up a couple feet to get a glimpse of that would probably have helped. Awesome shot all the same, I've been studying waterfall shots lately in prep for a trip to Oregon next month.

This is a good suggestion. The tripod I was carrying isn't very tall and I wanted to avoid raising the center column.

hes gone wrote in post #17048004
=he's gone;17048004]was going to say the exact same thing.

if that isn't possible, try to get a tree in the scene. cool shot, did you use a ND filter?

No ND filter, it was quite shady so I was able to get ~4s exposue at f/11 and ISO 50.

Didereaux wrote in post #17050646
The classic way of giving perspective in a pic like this is to get something in the very near foreground and make it very sharp. Wide angle, something in the foreground, and the background will gain perspective and the picture have excellent depth.

Interesting, I'll have to try that next time. Is the idea to have the background blurred slightly or would focus stacking give a similar effect as long as the close object is in focus?

raptor3x wrote in post #17052033
Interesting, I'll have to try that next time. Is the idea to have the background blurred slightly or would focus stacking give a similar effect as long as the close object is in focus?

No. On a shot like that which is scenic it is ideal to have ALL of it in focus. Depending upon the foreground object, placement etc it can be somewhat out of focus, but the middle, and background never. Search for Art Wolf, and look at his scenic shots. He is a master at this sort of shot (there are many others) but he comes to mind first.