An Architectural Photography Lens Will Minimize Perspective Distortion
Are you serious about architectural photography?
Unless you have the right lens, many of your photos will be distorted.
Lens Problems to Avoid
For great architectural photography, you need a lens that:
- Does not have pincushion distortion, or pull the edges in towards the middle
- Doesn’t have barrel distortion, or
- Does not vignette (darken) at the edges or corners
- That remains crisp to the edges
- Does not introduce perspective distortion – buildings that lean backwards
And, of course, the lens has to be sharp.
Most inexpensive lenses have several, if not most of these problems.
Canon Tilt+Shift Lenses: Serious Glass
When you’re ready for serious architectural photography, you need one of the Canon Tilt+Shift Lenses.
In particular, you need either the Canon TS-E 17mm or the Canon TS-E 24mm. Both are “L Glass” and run about $2300 give or take a few hundred – fluctuating since the earthquake in Japan.
The wider one, the 17mm, is fantastic for interior photos in particular. It can capture a huge room. It has a bubble-front lens, though, so it can’t take a filter (for protection).
I have the 24mm. This lens is nuts. The photos out of it and the Canon 5D Mark II are unbelievably sharp and gorgeous. I do virtually no post-processing at all.
Read the reviews on these lenses, on Amazon, and more importantly on B&H Photo Video.
Canon Tilt and Shift Video
This video will help you visualize what a shift lens can do for your photography.
Also, read this article on Tilt and Shift Lenses and Perspective Distortion.
About Alison
Always wondered why I had trouble get my photos to look right … great tip will have to look into this more… thanks again