Landscape/Portrait/Aspect Ratio & The Web

[Teflon-Mike]

Many years ago, I was loaned a Hassablad, by a chap determined to convert me to Medium Format.. he almost succeeded; but that's another story.

The 'thing' is that the 'blad took square pictures. My 35mm camera's of course took oblong ones. Which raises the question of 'preferred' viewing shape.

When showing people, non-camera-folk, pictures from either the borrowed 'Blad, or an antique Voiglander I had initially dabbled in MF with, often got the query "Where's the rest of the picture?' I got a similar query showing pictures from fish-eye; "Why's it round? Where's the rest of it?"

Now... looking at and critiquing pictures, we... 'Camera-folk' of course dive straight in and look at what is 'in' the picture, and start looking for... well whatever concerns us really, because we are 'above' such superficial points of first impression, and know better.... or are we?

It is a 'natural' thing, and when presented with a picture, we automatically start judging it on first impressions, AND the shape of the picture MATTERS.

Now; I am not a fan of wide-screen TV or Wide-Screen TV aspect ratio... BUT, it is actually a more 'natural' field of view.. maybe not what our eyes 'see', but what we look at in what our eyes see!

Psychologists can explain it in tedious detail; but it's the "You cant see what's right under your nose" effect. or my example... "Where's the Washing Powder?"... BIG, as in larger than your head, sized box. Brightly coloured, instantly recogniseable, thanks to so many washing powder adverts, this is an object that ought to literally leap out at you when you look for it... BUT.... people don't look up or down....... They will stand in the middle of a room and look round and round... but not at whats up on a shelf above their head or whats on the floor beneath their knees.. they could literally have a box of Daz fall on their head, or trip over it, without 'seeing' it!

(As a motorcyclist; this phenominon of "perception" is something I have researched quite extensively; The SMIDSY... "Sorry Mate! I Didn't See You!"... far too common a cause of motorcycling calamity; usually not due to people not 'looking' but not taking much notice of what they do 'see'.. but an asside to topic here)

So, Photo. How often do we critasise people for sticking the subject SLAP bang in the middle of frame, little care of whats in the corners, and always shooting 'Land-Scape', not thinking to tilt the camera through 90 Degrees to shoot 'Portrait' when that would better suit the subject?

Mia Culpa... LOTS.

BUT! I was working through some sets the other day; and I'll own up here, 99.9% of my pictures are only EVER going to be viewed on a screen.

Mostly by me, on my screen with a 'monitor' aspect ratio of 4:3....

Most of my photo's; taken on 35mm are 3:2 so short and wide, and taking up full width of MS Photo-Viewer window... top and bottom of the screen is filled with back-ground colour. Not a lot, and its not too distracting... :bang: Yeah... I dont look up or down do I?! See we ALL do it!

Bit better on my lap-top, of course, that has 16:9 aspect ratio, so masks them less....

UNTIL I have a photo in 'Portrait'... and jumping to fill the screen top to bottom, the sides... where we look most.. get filled with back-ground, and its half the screen!

And subconsciously, I was starting to get a bit frustrated by it, and when I opened a portrait mode photo, actually groaning before I really looked at it!

And I was starting to ponder pictures, and consciously wondering whether I could crop 3:2 portrait mode pics down a bit top and bottom, to perhaps 4:3 so they filled the screen a bit better.....

So... where does this lead us?

Well... basically, wide aspect ratio photo's fit very nicely onto wider aspect ratio screens, provided they are in landscape orientation.

Turn the camera, shoot portrait, and the wider the aspect ratio, the less nicely it fits onto a landscape orientated screen, and the more wide-aspect the screen and the picture, the more 'annoying' it is, due to the 'Cant see whats under our nose" effect.

Which begs a few questions; like:

-what is the 'nicest' proportions to shoot?
- do we avoid portrait orientation more these days as it works less well on modern viewing media?
- do we think more or less about it?
- is the age old advice of using the frame to advantage and not being scared to twist it 90 Degrees less important now?
- Should we think more about shooting FOR screen viewing?
And stuff like that?

So spoiler for a discussion; what do you reckon?

 

[RichardTaylor]

I let the subject "needs" dictate proportions and crop or shoot approprialy.

Most of my image also viewed "on screen" so the maximum dimensions are set for 1080x1920 when web publishing.

However most of my pics, probaly due to subject matter, are shot in landscape mode.

 

[omens]

I agree that modern devices have influence how I take photos. I view on a laptop but some people may view on a tablet which they can orietate easily. Most people don't have monitors that turn portrait (remember those?).

I also shoot and work in 3:2 format as that's what I'm used to, it's what the sensor size is, and it's what I'll print at. Hence if I need to crop photos, the ratio remains at 3:2.

 

[szymon]

I was recently showing some photos via my iPhone and a portable projector I have. The thing is so clever that it automatically shows a "full screen" image both in landscape and in portrait. That is, if the picture is landscape the image on the wall is landscape, and if the image is portrait then it appears on the wall as a portrait of exactly the same size as the landscape, with the dimensions switched. At the end of the presentation there were multiple comments about how cleverly it displayed the images.

I don't think there is anything "intrinsically" better about wide-screen portrait images. The reason you sigh is because the display medium doesn't dynamically change to suit your picture! If it did, I think you'd be just as happy.

Think of an art gallery - where the display medium is canvas in frame. Do the portrait oriented paintings jar? Or do they suit perfectly to the subject matter (if the artist is any good)?

-simon

 

[Phil V]

I think the Greeks had a 'magic rectangle' and I'm sure it was 4:3, but I could be wrong.

One of the academics will know for certain. However, I've never encountered the 'some of its missing' type comments, although I've heard odd comments regarding pictures not fitting the frame exactly, and the weirdest thing are people who can quite happily look at stretched images :nuts:

 

[Nod]

Being a dinosaur, I rarely show my photos to people in anything other than print form and the ones for public consumption generally get printed at A4, although I do do 6x4s for our own perusal but these albums don't get shown to many - who wants to see an album full of someone else's holiday memories?

All my cameras are set to take pictures in the 3:2 aspect ratio (or 2:3 in portrait orientation!) and probably 80% or more are in landscape orientation - often with the horizon running through the middle. My preponderance of landscape images is more down to me not taking many portraits than other taste factors, although if a subject/scene demands it, I'll often shoot one (or a couple) if each and see which works best. Of course, sometimes we have to use one orientation in preference to the other simply to fit the subject into the frame!

When building albums, I do tend to pair up images shot in portrait and set them on facing pages so both can be viewed with the album turned through 90 degrees. If it's a multi image per page album (I tend to avoid these), I'll try to have all pictures on the page in the same orientation. Slightly oddly, I often take vertical panoramas and even do 180 degree pans to try to capture what many people miss overhead.

In conclusion, most of us take pictures that please US rather than trying to pander to the tastes of others, so if YOU like the more upright portrait orientation, use it!

 

[Teflon-Mike]

I think the Greeks had a 'magic rectangle' and I'm sure it was 4:3, but I could be wrong.

Pythagoras' 3-4-5 right angle triangle....
Favoured by masons & carpeters since time immemorial.... easy to square up

 

[MadWoman]

I have always found that 3:2 looks a bit too long and thin, and consequently I crop most of mine to 7x5 or occasionally 4x5 or 16x9 and frame the shots with this in mind. I would think that about 2/3 of my shots are landscape format - I simply orientate the camera to suit the shot (and really must get a grip to make it easier!).