Straightening question

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robertdc

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Robert
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Hi,

I do mainly street photography using a Ricoh GR which has a 28mm equivalent lens. What I find is that there is always some slanting of verticals in the picture. I usually use the straightening tool in Aperture to balance it better but when I straighten one element then inevitably that comes at the expense of further slanting something else.

For example, if I have a person walking through a doorway, then I can straighten the person/doorway but end up with a slanting window or lamp post further to the side of the photo.

I guess this is really a composition issue. Are there any rules about where to prioritise straightening, e.g nearest verticals, human subject over objects etc? Or, is there any way to straighten comprehensively? I tried using DXO Optics Pro trial with the Ricoh GR lens adjustment but that doesn't really seem to make much difference.

Maybe I shouldn't worry too much about slanting in a street image?

Thanks in advance for any feedback!
 
Hi Robert, Welcome to TP. :wave:

I don't think there are rules as such, everything is subjective, right?

I tend to use my wide angle lens creatively, I like the strangeness of it! If I do straighten then I use the adaptive wide angle filter in photoshop.
 
robertdc said:
Hi,

I do mainly street photography using a Ricoh GR which has a 28mm equivalent lens. What I find is that there is always some slanting of verticals in the picture. I usually use the straightening tool in Aperture to balance it better but when I straighten one element then inevitably that comes at the expense of further slanting something else.

For example, if I have a person walking through a doorway, then I can straighten the person/doorway but end up with a slanting window or lamp post further to the side of the photo.

I guess this is really a composition issue. Are there any rules about where to prioritise straightening, e.g nearest verticals, human subject over objects etc? Or, is there any way to straighten comprehensively? I tried using DXO Optics Pro trial with the Ricoh GR lens adjustment but that doesn't really seem to make much difference.

Maybe I shouldn't worry too much about slanting in a street image?

Thanks in advance for any feedback!
Click to expand...

I wouldn't worry. Google just brought up this collection of street images by the master HCB himself http://abduzeedo.com/classic-photography-henri-cartier-bresson Nothing is straight!

But if you correct the verticals, they'll all be correct. Maybe you mean the wide-angle 'volume anamorphosis' thing that pulls the sides and corners out of shape? DxO has software to address that, here http://www.dxo.com/intl/photography/dxo-viewpoint/features

Welcome to TP :)
 
robertdc said:
Hi,
Maybe I shouldn't worry too much about slanting in a street image?
Click to expand...

Mostly I wouldn't worry about it. It just sounds to me like it's the angle of the camera. If the camera is pointed up or down rather than level the straight lines will surely slant.

This should be visible on screen (the camera doesn't have a VF does it?) so you'll see the effect of pointing the camera anything but level.
 
I tend to correct for lens distortion first before straightening. Remember at the wider angles, you'll get a distortion effect where the edges of objects will curve.
 
Thanks everyone for the helpful advice. Glad to hear you don't think its too critical. I'll just have to check the screen view on camera more carefully when I can, although I often shoot very quickly to capture a fleeting scene. The DXO Viewpoint software sounds interesting but apparently its not compatible with Aperture.
 
I have a simple rule of thumb of my own for 'straight' bits...

Let's imagine the subject is a person close to the centre of the image, if there is a vertical near them then that nearest one either should be perfectly vertical or more than 3 degrees out

Why 3 degrees or more?

When we see a door/window etc. we know in reality it will be vertical in almost all cases, so if its a wee bit out it can look wrong, if its more than 3 degrees out we can accept that that's so 'wrong' it must be an intentional artistic tilt - in which case its perfectly acceptable

As for verticals/horizontals that are bent by the lens further away from the subject - who cares is my view - and in fact vertical leaning in can add to the effect by forcing your attention more towards the subject near the centre

Same with seas - level is great, 3 degrees or more is artistic and can be great, 0.2 degrees is just sloppy work !!!

Dave
 
Are you talking about perspective distortion or actually slatnted images? Perspective distortion is very hard to correct without screwing other elements of an image up, but can usually be done. Part of the fun of wideangle though is to exaggerate perspective so if you want to avoid it you're going to have to take great care to never point the lens up or down relative to the subject.

Slanted images are easy to correct, you just rotate the image and it's corrected. If you're finding this rotates something else differently you have perspective distortion.
 
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