Explain it like I'm 5: wide-angle lenses for landscapes

Have to also keep in mind that a 3D scene is always more enjoyable than a 2D nearly infinite DOF rendering of the same scene.

Let's put a 48' tall statue 100' away from me. And a city skyline is 2.0 miles away from me...

1. I mount a 50mm lens on my FF camera.
   The statue stands the full height (short dimension) of the frame. Along the horizontal, the frame captures a 1.44 mile wide swath of the city skyline.
   
2. Now I switch to a 24mm WA lens on my FF camera.
   The 48' tall statue (still 100' away from me) now fills only 48% of the frame height, which is now seeing 100' vertical in the frame. Along the horizontal, the frame now captures a 3.0 mile wide swath of the city skyline which is 2 miles from the camera.
   

1. The 48' tall statue fills the 20" print vertical
   
2. The 3.0 mile wide city skyline fills the 62.4" print horizontal' of which the original 1.44 mile wide swath of the city fills 30" of the horizontal dimension of the 62.4" print!
   

TeamSpeed wrote in post #19016854
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Have to also keep in mind that a 3D scene is always more enjoyable than a 2D nearly infinite DOF rendering of the same scene.
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Always? . Hmmmmm .....

Do you think that may be subject to personal tastes? . Do you think that perhaps some people are more prone to enjoy a 3D-like rendering, while some of us may prefer the aesthetics of a more flattened out 2D-like rendering of the scene?


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Tom Reichner wrote in post #19016884
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Always? . Hmmmmm .....

Do you think that may be subject to personal tastes? . Do you think that perhaps some people are more prone to enjoy a 3D-like rendering, while some of us may prefer the aesthetics of a more flattened out 2D-like rendering of the scene?

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Sure always was a strong term, but your brain does indeed decipher 3D space differently than 2D equivalents, provided you have use of both eyes.

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Hmmmm.

I'm usually trying to flatten a scene out and find a way to photograph it that shows less depth. . I guess that's why I'm mostly a wildlife photographer and don't do very well with landscapes.

EDIT:
Now that I've thought about it some more, if I find an animal with a scenic backdrop behind it, I do like to get close to the animal and have it in the foreground, and the scenic landscape in the background - a.k.a. "environmental portraiture". . So I guess I do seek for depth at times .... but only when animals are involved, when it's just inanimate things I prefer little/no depth.

Foolish wrote in post #19016170
I'm not a landscape photographer, but whenever I try to take a quick photo of a nice 'scape with my iPhone, for example, I'm always left thinking that the landscape is way more impressive as seen with my eyes than it is in the photo. The mountains or features always look so much smaller in the photo, and I don't usually like the image much.

Yea, when I try to take some fashion shots and I just take out my iphone and snap a pic of the model she never looks as impressive as in real life.



I know, you were asking, but yes, there is a lot more to it than just focal length. Landscape photography requires just as much thought and skill as any other genre.

ejenner wrote in post #19017155
Yea, when I try to take some fashion shots and I just take out my iphone and snap a pic of the model she never looks as impressive as in real life.



I know, you were asking, but yes, there is a lot more to it than just focal length. Landscape photography requires just as much thought and skill as any other genre.

lol, fair rib, but the main reason I think it looks unimpressive is because everything is much smaller.

I guess I was more looking for a discussion along the lines of, "yes, wide angles make some important features look much smaller, but here's how you make it a good photo ANYWAY, and why wide angle is WORTH the shrinking of certain features (and even preferable, to many people?)."

Foolish wrote in post #19017315
lol, fair rib, but the main reason I think it looks unimpressive is because everything is much smaller.

I guess I was more looking for a discussion along the lines of, "yes, wide angles make some important features look much smaller, but here's how you make it a good photo ANYWAY, and why wide angle is WORTH the shrinking of certain features (and even preferable, to many people?)."

Standing at a reasonable (>8') distance from people, WA makes the whole person (and everything in the whole scene) 'smaller in the photo (compared to 'normal') because more total area is shrunk to fit the 24mm x 36mm frame size.

Standing quite close to people (<6'), the wider WA lenses will make PARTS of people larger, due to the 'induced perspective distortion' where the nearest parts of people, closest to the lens, are exaggerated to be 'large' while parts of people that are 1' away are much smaller in the photo even if they are identically sized in reality!
I complain to my doctor, "My right hand swells when I hold it close to the lens!"...

Wilt wrote in post #19017454
That has nothing to do with shooting landscapes with WA, BTW. But getting back on the topic of WA for landscapes, the photos which I used here are a good illustration of the effect of WA. In the 1st shot, I am standing about 25' from the back wall seen in the first photo (the room is 20' wide). But in the photo it looks like the room goes back about 50' behind me!
And then in the 3-shot series, facing the other way, it looks like the room is about 80' long and 20' wide.

I appreciate you going to all this trouble to explain the concepts! -- I do understand that, but I guess the conversation I was really looking for (I'm sure I didn't word my original post specifically enough) is:

• What are some common "best practices" of landscape photographers (or any kind of photographers that use wide angles) that make good use of the effects of a wide-angle lens?
  
• How do landscape (or any WA) photographers make the specific perspective features of the WA work to their benefit?
  
• What are some of the ways you can make a WA landscape interesting and compelling GIVEN THAT the lens will make some of the key features look quite unimpressive? (in other words, how do you compensate for tiny, far away mountains, OR, do you just not shoot those kinds of scenes with a WA? Wilt, you addressed this in terms of print size, but what if you're NOT printing?)
  
• What specifically is appealing about the WA lens to many landscape (or any WA) photographers -- are there any answers other than some variation of scope / scale / vastness / drama, or is that really the main appeal?
  

I suggest that you go back to Post 1 and edit it to direct the readers, "Before replying, jump ahead to Post 24 for a better, more explicity worded expression of what I am really after!"

I will add:
One of the best ways is to NOT USE a WA lens, but to place a 'normal' or even a short telephoto lens on the camera, place the camera on a tripod with a pan head, and take a series of overlapping shots with camera set to manual to get identical exposure from shot to shot, so that you can then use software to stitch the photos together into a panoramic photo.

Go to https://dofsimulator.n​et/en/ which is actually a depth of field simulator, but it works well for showing field of view. In fact, I would suggest you use the very well done examples that Wilt provided in reply 7 and play with the simulator to see the "visual."

When that screen opens you will see a caricature of a woman, hands on hips and the bottom of the image is roughly mid-thigh and the top slightly more than her full head. Peruse down the left edge and you will see the image is from a 35mm format, an 85mm lens at f/1.4 and the subject distance is at 3 meters (just short of 10 feet). In the "Sensor size" field, use the drop down menu to show APS-C (Canon) and note the image change. You now see the caricature showing from approximately the waist to about the top of her head. Check and you will note the lens is still shown as 85mm at f/1.4 and the subject distance is still 3 meters. The change in what you see is totally due to the change in sensor size. An analogy would be you have two cameras around your neck, one full frame and one APS-C, both with the same focal length length lens. The two images are what you would see with the two cameras.

Play with the simulator to see the changes and once you understand focal length and sensor size change the scenario for the intended purpose of the simulator, depth of field. Go back to the original screen settings, 35mm format, 85mm focal length and f/1.4 aperture. Note the background of the image is quite blurry. Change the aperture to f/16 and you now see that the caricature is in front of a landscape that includes some buildings.

You can use the sliders to make changes as well.

Wilt wrote in post #19017503
I suggest that you go back to Post 1 and edit it to direct the readers, "Before replying, jump ahead to Post 24 for a better, more explicity worded expression of what I am really after!"

Fair enough! I didn't realize how many people would read it as a question about the difference in perspective -- I understand that, but what I'm wondering about is why people like WA, best ways / situations in which to use WA, what to take into account when composing with WA, etc.

I've edited my first post and I again thank you for all the time you've spent!

For many of us, we like photographs because they DON'T show what we see every day. It's about the lie, the fantasy, making the world look better.

When I take a photo of a wild beasty, if I use a normal lens, the shot looks "normal" and uninteresting, because we and our 40mm lens, can't get close enough to offer an image that we can't just see from standing there. so we use huge long lenses, and that offers a point of view that we can't see on our own.

The same applies to super wide angle, we get to see things in a different point of view ( or perspective, but I could catch flack for using that term here)

Seeing something that we can't see with our own eyes is part of the excitement about photography.

Now shake off those wide angle blues and go look at the Macro forum to decompress.

Foolish wrote in post #19017511
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Fair enough! I didn't realize how many people would read it as a question about the difference in perspective -- I understand that, but what I'm wondering about is why people like WA, best ways / situations in which to use WA, what to take into account when composing with WA, etc.
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I completely "got you" the first time around. . I think you had worded the original post just fine.

I think that everyone here understands the relative subject sizes that a WA perspective gives us. . That is really basic stuff that almost everybody on a photography forum will already have a firm handle on.

Like you, I am interested in discussing the aesthetics that result from this perspective - what we like and don't like about it when it comes to the look or feel of an image taken with various angles of view.


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CyberDyneSystems wrote in post #19017531
For many of us, we like photographs because they DON'T show what we see every day. It's about the lie, the fantasy, making the world look better.

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Seeing something that we can't see with our own eyes is part of the excitement about photography.

This is a very good point!

However, I maintain that in many (most?) cases, I'm not sure (personally!) that shrinking the interesting features in a scene with a WA lens = "making the world look better." Obviously, plenty of people disagree with me there, because there are a LOT of those shots, but when I'm standing in front of a beautiful vista, my first thought isn't, "how can I make this stuff look smaller?" lol.

Thus my original post -- I clearly don't understand the appealing features of the WA lens for landscapes. Was hoping to learn about a different point of view from folks who use wide angles a lot and really like them!