Church Street Church

One of my better B+Ws. Feel free to comment on it. Just don't say

things like I should have used a tilt/shift lens, sorry I can't afford

such things. Feel free to check my other photographs out.

"...don't me to use a tilt/shift lens..."

 

Well, I'll tell you cheaper ways to get around the problem:

 

1) The converging lines come from tilting the camera upward. Point the camera level, then either use a wider lens, or back up to get the entire church framed. Crop the print to get the composition you want.

 

2)Go to www.kievcamera.com and buy a Russian made Arsat 35mm shift only lens in Canon mount($259). Quality is said to be decent.

 

3) swap for a useable Nikon and find a Nikkor 35mm PC lens ($400 or so depending on condition)

 

4) buy a used Canon 35mm Tilt/shift lens ($789, Demo at www.adorama.com) if that's in your budget.

 

*********

 

Other than the converging lines, I would suggest a little more contrast in the print. I like the composition...most people would frame the church head on.

I agree the contrast needs a bit of snap. The converging verticals can be easily fixed in one of the better editing packages such as Photoshop or Paintshop Pro. There is an example here. No need for even a cheap Russian PC lens.

I agree with you on the getting father away or using a wider lens but in this case neither was possable. I'm at the back of a parking lot on the other side of the street and 35mm is the widest lens I currently have. Also if I had $285 I would buy the lens you suggest but even that is out my budget.

I actually own Paint Shop Pro. How exactly do you correct it. A deformation tool? Rotating would only work if all the straight lines were near each other. As far a contrast the clouds could be whiter but other than that any contrasting would make the picture look unnatural... Increasing the contrast makes the picture darker and complicating with lightening the picture make the right-hand tower far to white. Burning selected areas would probably work though...

if a building keeps you from going further back, either stand a ladder against the side of it, or gain permission to enter the building and take the photo out a window or from the roof.

 

Another trick I have used is to stand a folding ladder in the back of my pickup, then take the photo from the top of the ladder. This works if you have a safe level spot to stop the vehicle, and only need a few feet of elevation. A pickup and ladder is easier to rent or borrow than a crane! Safety is a concern so be careful if you take that route.

 

If you can fix the photo with software, great, but Photoshop costs more than the lens we discussed.

Photoshop may cost more than the lens, but PSP doesn't, and of course has lots of other uses. Use the deformation tool - if I can remember this correctly, the procedure is:

• Select all
• Promote to layer (tool is now available)
• Hold [Ctrl] or [shift] while dragging the upper or lower corners

You need to be careful that the whole image is dragged, otherwise you will get conspicuous shear lines.Regards

Paul

I used Photoshop but it should work the same with Photoshop LE or GIMP. I don't know of the Paintshop support for Phostoshop plugins is good enough. You can get the tools from

• http://www.fh-furtwangen.de/~dersch/ (closed til 9/10)
• http://home.no.net/dmaurer/%7Edersch/Index.htm (mirror)
• http://www.ptgui.com and the download link.

I'll attach a copy of your photo corrected with pitch=20 following the instructions on http://home.no.net/dmaurer/~dersch/architect/arch.html. But be prepared to play around w/lots of settings. (Tip: you have to convert the image to RGB for the tools to work.)

I forgot I was viewing it at 50% in Photoshop.