Re: a "normal" lens



Peter Irwin wrote:
Gordon Moat <moat@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:


I wish I still had the exact precise reference, but as best I recall the 50 mm was originally chosen for the none rangefinder camera because it captured the same foreground to background relationship as our eyes do.


Apparent perspective is correct when:

viewing distance = focal length x enlargement factor.



Rather than the scientific or photographic technical definition of perspective, I learned it from drawing and art foundations classes. In that we were not given formulas, just a statement of the relationship of foreground to background objects. I would imagine that human eyes are similar enough that there would be little variation in perception of such relationships.

Sometimes we can be quite critical of this. A few years ago
I took some pictures at an office lunch meeting with a Konica Auto S2 with a 45mm lens. I printed the pictures
as 5x7s, and a co-worker made the interesting observation
that distances seemed exaggerated in the photographs.
I then did some 7x10 inch prints which looked more correct.

45mm x 5 = 22.5cm or just under 9 inches (too close)

45mm x 7 = 31.5cm or a bit over 12 inches (good distance)

I was quite surprised that someone would notice this given
that most snapshots are taken with wider than normal lenses
and printed at 4x enlargement, but it is worth keeping in
mind.



So I wonder, going with the old Oskar Barnack approach to 35 mm, what print sizes were commonly used? Seems to me that it would have been 20 cm by 25 cm. So how would that fit into the formulas? I seem to recall that the early Leica 50 mm lenses were closer to 51 mm, but I might be remembering that incorrectly.



The early editions of the Leica Manual have a discussion
of this.


These types of reasons are why some formally trained artists who used cameras often chose to do most of their images with 50 mm lenses on 35 mm cameras; I think it might also be why the 50 mm lens is still a good choice for creative imaging.


Some of the old pictorialists favoured a lens that
was 1.5 times to 2 times the diagonal. In 35mm terms that
would translate into 64 to 86mm. If you are going to hang
a picture on a wall you are likely to look at it from a
distance which is somewhat greater than the diagonal
measurement unless the picture is very large indeed.

Peter.

I have found that a short telephoto can be good for isolating details. However, if it were a larger scene, say maybe a cityscape, if someone stood in the exact spot as the photographer, the use of a telephoto lens would provide a different relationship of foreground to background than what the unaided human eye would see. Granted that could be more interesting, so use of a longer lens would be a creative choice.

I recall Henri Cartier-Bresson in an interview once stated that he was the camera, implying that he saw the world as his camera saw it. The majority of his images were taken using a 50 mm lens. It just seems that foreground to background relationship is what he meant, since the field of view is much less than the human eyes can see.

Ciao!

Gordon Moat
A G Studio
<http://www.allgstudio.com>

.

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