How to leverage a collapsed perspective

I have been thinking about 35mm film.

For me, I dont like a stretched wide angle perspective. For that, I shoot 6x9 format with a normal lens. I get the wide perspective without the skew.

For 35mm then,for me, its really about subject isolation at 50mm or zooming in to something that would be impossible to walk to. Like perhaps a pattern of wires on a bridge, or some other repeating pattern like that. I dont shoot animals or birds etc.

But too much zoom collapses perspective.

I am wondering if there are examples of how to use the 400mm+ focal length to photograph a scene and use that collapsed look as a specific form to enhance the photo....vs that same scene at 80mm. You would see all the same things, but at 80mm everything would look different. You would of course, have to walk much closer to take it.

Not talking about portraits or street. I am talking more about fine art photography...shapes, tones, lines, curves, colors. Maybe a still life scene.

Perhaps I will need to explain in this more , I am not sure if this was clear. In fact, I am not even sure myself what I mean, truly.

Assume in all of this I have the first required component, talent. Which is surely not the case

I have only one example from my own photos, taken probably at 800 mm. Its a desert landscape with windmills.

Perspective, as I'm sure you know, is determined by distance from the key subject, not the lens per se. I find most of my landscapes are taken near the "normal" focal length, because that is the most suited to my concept of composition. While a wide angle lens is well suited to emphasizing a nearby object relative to the background, it does not produce attractive results when you try to "get it all" in a single shot. There's too much sky and dirt, and the geography is flattened. On the whole, I tend to compose with a bias toward longer focal lengths, rather than shorter than "normal" 50 mm (or whatever, depending on the format).

A 400 mm lens is much longer than "normal," and has the power to isolate the subject, exaggerate the background, and render the contour of the landscape more dramatic. The rolling hills of Ireland provide a suitable example

Sony A7Rii + Sony 100-400/4.5-5.6 GM @ 400 mm, f/8 and 1/800, ISO 1600

oh man, these are both awesome. This is exactly what I was thinking. I struggle with wide angle lenses for landscape, because it never seems to look great. Its not easy I think though to find these things with the eyeball as you are walking around, unless you are trained to it. If the sheep were this close to you in terms of size as you were standing there, you would never see the background like that. The image, does not actually exist in reality...only through the lens. This, for some reason, i find fascinating haha.

Thanks so much for sharing.

I have a 200mm and have been noticing this effect, and want to move up to a longer focal length and try to look specifically for these opportunities. I think its a way to bring together a very expansive scene with things going on at multiple depths, into one photo, and perhaps more accurately recreate what it "felt" like to be there and observe it all with the eyes and the brain...

I often make a self-challenge to see things in a new way, exploring possibilities with a single lens in a familiar place. Aside from astrophotography (e.g., the Milky Way), a wide angle lens isn't needed to capture a wide field of view, rather perspective in a new way. In this case I was about 12" from the stone lantern, using it to frame the Japanese bridge, and a young Japanese woman who happened by. This scene is in the Chicago Botanic Garden.

The photo of the sheep was no accident, nor is this (the woman was pure serendipity). Learning to "see" is both useful and in invigorating, well worth experimentation.

Sony A7Riii + Loxia 21/2.8, 1/125@f/5.6, ISO 100

400mm on an FX camera:

Distance to the palm tree from where I was standing about 300 feet.

a wide angle lens isn't needed to capture a wide field of view

I disagree - I don't see any other way to create an image of this sweeping vista without using a wide-angle - 24mm on FX in this case:

How would I do this one without a wide-angle? (20mm on FX)

This one sure benefitted from a long focal length - 500mm on DX

220mm on DX:

This requires 16mm on FX to get the entire lake into the frame - I wouldn't want it any other way (OK, I could have panorama stitched for the same FOV - I'd get more resolution but no change in perspective (since I'd be standing at the same position).

I disagree - I don't see any other way to create an image of this sweeping vista without using a wide-angle - 24mm on FX in this case:

Your use of focal length is entirely appropriate for the subject matter and composition. IMO, there's just the right amount of sky and dirt (foreground). When the main subject has less relative height, a stitched panorama using a longer lens can also be effective.

I used a wide angle lens plus stitching, because the mountain looms very large at only 5 miles distance. A 50 mm lens barely covers the crater.

Mt. St. Helens, Washington, 24 mm, 3 frames stitched

Mt. St. Helens, Washington, 24 mm

Mt. St. Helens, Washington, 42mm

In many cases one can't really play with perspective as there are quite limited ways to get closer or farther away.

My mistake. The images composing the panorama above were taken with a Loxia 50 mm lens. For some reason the panorama image was tagged as 24 mm.

As you show above, you can play with perspective, even if you can't get significantly closer to or further from the mountain, by including closer objects in the composition.

In each instance, there is considerable detail in the foreground of St. Helens which lends itself to wide angle rendition. The wholesale destruction is abundantly evident after nearly 40 years.

In a different situation, imagine shooting the front range in Colorado from someplace in Denver. There aren't any mountains which stand out from the rest, so the range becomes a crooked trim on the city's gridwork. If the city layout is your ideal foreground, okay, but if you want the mountains to look over manmade objects, you use a telephoto.

This was a long time ago, of what I think was called "Three Kings Mountain." It was taken with an Hasselblad, and my longest lense at the time was 80 mm (normal). While not exactly a wide angle shot, it is way more sage brush and way less mountain than I would prefer. It was the closest overlook, and you can't see much of the mountain from ground level. With a telephoto, I could get a clear view of the mountain, perhaps framed with some of that lovely scrub. For obvious reasons, this is the first time I've looked at this image since 2004, much less published it.

Don't be put off by the metadata. This was a 6x6 negative, copied recently using a Sony A7Rii camera.

Cropped to the equivalent of a 200 mm FF lens from the original (below)

Cropped to the equivalent of 300 mm FF lens, and 3:2 proportions, a mountain massif begins to look like a mountain against mid-range details.

Every focal length has a use for landscapes, depending on the situation. A wide angle lens is effective if you have a high point of view with few obstructions, and a lot of interesting things in the foreground which contribute to the composition. The Visitors Center at Mt. St. Helens is just such a view, and was not the best example to use for longer focal lengths. At a distance of 5 miles, the volcano takes more than a glimpse to encompass its expanse.

In the Appalachians, the Smokies for example, you seldom have a clear view due to tall trees and the generally low position of the trails. There and also in basin-and-range areas of the west, you travel along broad valleys, some distance from the mountains and also from significant structures to give them a sense of scale, as illustrated above.

In Iceland, the mountains are many, bur relatively modest (<2000 ft) until juxtaposed with buildings. Most of the farmsteads are located near the base of these hills at some distance from the road. A long lens puts things into better perspective. There are many earthquakes, and boulders the size of houses often litter the ground.

Sony A7ii + 70-200/4 at 200 mm, 1/200 @ f/10, ISO 200