I bumped into two very thought provoking blogs about wide angle shots. One of the super things about this forum is the great variety of interest and opinions the members bring to it.
I'd like to highlight these two interesting questions, add some detail of my own and hopefully broaden the discussion a bit.
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First off, Kathy Neilson, a Stager asks us to consider that wide angle shots may not always the best marketing in her blog; Choosing the Right Photo.
She is making the point that sometimes a narrow, more intimate shot can be highly effective also.
I think she makes a very good point. Too often when shooting listings we (myself included on occasion) tend to think 'wider is better, wider is better' without giving proper consideration to how to best showcase the feel of a home.
I will share with you that the top competition in my field (an excellent photographer btw) has made a brand of shooting highly stylized 'narrow' shots that while not showing the full space, transmit tremendous mood / ambiance.
I'll include below a few examples of my own in this category to hopefully spur your creative thoughts when you are out shooting:
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Secondly Lee Jinks, a Realtor reminds us that one can go to extremes on the wide angle front in his blog Can a lens be too wide?
Here Lee is looking at different lens types (by focal length) and sharing some examples about how different levels of distortion might impact the overall photo, both artistically and in terms of how 'realistic' a representation it is of the space.
Lee makes some very good points and I hope you stop by his blog. I do want to add some details I think it's important to consider when working at wide angles.
Let's start by looking at the 35mm standard, the 50mm lens. This is often called a 'normal' lens as it closely approximates human vision. If you are into photography you've probably heard this all your life. Actually, that's only sort of true.
Try this expiriment if you will, sit and one end of the room and look across it. Chances are good you are 'seeing' about a third of space (center) in focus and that indeed does match roughly the view one might get from a 50mm lens (on a full frame sensor). However, do you see anything off to the side? Of course you do, because you have peripheral vision.
Unless you've hade some majaor damage to your eyes or brain you actually 'see' a very wide horizontal image, the center is sharp and the sides are blurred. Ever wonder why movies are shot in wide horizontal format? It's actually a closer amalgam to what you are seeing on a daily basis.
I'll go so far to say wide angle shots are closer to human vision, excepting that they are typically sharp across the whole image and they also introduce certain spatial distortions such as volume animorphosis.
This brings me to my second point:
There's a huge difference between an inexpensive wide angle lens and an expensive one. Cheap wide angle lenses often suffer from severe barrel, complex, and volume animorphosis distortion...some even throw in pincushioning at the center for good measure!
However, all is not lost.
It is quite possible to work at very wide angles and still produce high quality images that don't look like a bad acid trip. Here's a few example of images on the extreme wide angle end (~17mm). I think it's fair to say if I hadn't made a point of telling you how truely wide these shots are your first impression wouldn't be; 'wow, those are some really wide / distorted images". Chances are good you'd simply focus on the pleasing aspect of the image. But as Lee correctly points out, that's entirely up to you. :)
Cheers, -B
Photographers
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Bryce,
I LOVE your camera angles -- they are so stylish! Thanks for sharing these excellent pointers about photography.