I believe that this 3d effect is the result of very high sharpness (even with little contrast) at open apertures.


this was taken with a 75mm f/1.5 zeiss at f/2 (unfortunately at iso 1600). I would like to believe that the head pops out rather three-dimensionally

A lot of people are showing this 3D look using photos that have shallow DOF, but I think it's actually even more evident in well-chosen shots with infinite DOF. I can tell you that the 8x10 contact print I made yesterday, with infinite focus, absolutely has that 3D effect.

DrPablo wrote:
A lot of people are showing this 3D look using photos that have shallow DOF, but I think it's actually even more evident in well-chosen shots with infinite DOF. I can tell you that the 8x10 contact print I made yesterday, with infinite focus, absolutely has that 3D effect.

My first guess is it is the transition between the focus plane to out-of-focus -- But I think you are also correct. There is something working in 8x10 contact prints (and large format) that 35mm has a difficult time achieving (regardless of resolution, ppi, etc). But some 35mm does exhibit a 3d effect. Maybe there are several approaches

I see the effect more in print than on screen.

Hmmmm...how are these for a 3d effect?

1ds II + cz21

I am more convinced than ever before that the "3-D effect" comes simply from use of DOF, perspective, and sometimes judicious use of a tilt-shift lens (similar to the "toy miniature" effect).

the headstones frame really works

bokeh is fine and it works
but how are you going to make a digital flat subject look 3D in itself

Wear red & blue glasses?

Edited by Brent Ward on Apr 26, 2007 at 09:13 AM GMT

nope, they still look flat

Left one looks best. Otherwise, I have no idea which is which. Lighting plays a huge part, imho more than the glass or body.
Best
Joey

TeamSK jay wrote:
It seems logical that a 3D effect is achieved by tricking the brain into viewing a flat 2D image as though it is being seen in real life 3D with your own eyes. When you look at something only the area you are directly looking at is in focus, other areas are out of focus. So an out of focus rendering which looks the same as seen in real life would seem to add the most to the illusion.


That's what I think, but I'd throw in that it is all relevant to viewing distances and size of the print or monitor image. I have seen prints that look '3-D' and look totally flat when enlarged further and reviewed up close.

'Too much' bokeh or totally blowing out the background IMO kills the effect. You still need to see what is there as you normally would with your peripheral vision, which is more acute than most would think.

For relatively compressed landscapes, bokeh can be eliminated (or almost eliminated) and still look 3-D, because that is how it would be rendered to the eye in reality.

I believe that what people call 'micro contrast' plays a role in the '3d' effect. Looking at the light house picture taken with the 35-70 you (or I) see subtle changes in the colour as the building rotate. This is in part due to the high contrast but also the ability to capture and distinguish very fine changes in colour. As a counter example the wooden sign taken with the tamron 17-50 seems to have less variance than I would expect across the wood.

Naturally subject matter, lighting and DOF play a role in the ability to emphasis these subtle shift. I believe that zeiss lens (or perhaps the coating on the lens) has the ability to emphasis these subtle shifts (another example I often seen are subtle changes in colour across a single broad leaf).

Anyways, that is my guess as to what we are calling the '3d' effect.

Edited by you2 on Apr 26, 2007 at 07:29 PM GMT

The 3-D look is difficult to see unless you are told that the image was made with a Leica. Then it just pops right out at you.

George Deliz

Grant808 wrote:
'Too much' bokeh or totally blowing out the background IMO kills the effect. You still need to see what is there as you normally would with your peripheral vision, which is more acute than most would think.

For relatively compressed landscapes, bokeh can be eliminated (or almost eliminated) and still look 3-D, because that is how it would be rendered to the eye in reality.


I completely agree. It's a bit of a fad for people to go for completely obliterative bokeh, but I think it's compositionally sloppy a lot of the time. It takes the subject completely out of context, fails to create interplay between foreground and background, wipes away suggestions of depth, and rather than looking lifelike it just looks imprecise and isolated.

I do concur with others that transitions in and out of focus help the 3D effect, but that doesn't answer Grant's and my point that you can see that 3D look even if the entire image is in perfect focus. Obviously DOF has nothing to do with it in that case.

The more I look at images described as 3D, the more I think that having real luminosity (with texture) is key.

Among what is evident, that is relative focus, overall contrast, subjects that are more three-dimensional themselves... I think there is someting that has not yet considered: relative contrast.

I'll explain it: The same way that receding objects become pogressively out of focus resulting in 3D efect, receding objects that decrease contrast progressively in a subtle way, also give this efect. I think that this could be achieved in postprocess, but you would have a hard time making selections to alter contrast in a subtle way. I also think that lenses have a minor roll in this, especially the lens that are known for being contrasty. Let me explain: Imagine an image that has flare overall. If you artificially try to restore the overall contrast as it should be, those subtles variations in relative contrast can not be recovered because they are not there, resulting in a flat image. So, those lenses with fewer elements and cleverly coated I think have this advantage. Anyway I think that the differences are subtle and not allways noticeable.

.

i think a deeper more film like tonality has something to do with it too
additional sheens and shines take that flatness away

the mostly green of the shot and pattern of the leaves makes it more difficult.
I notice the effect more when there are color differences - just a thought

Rob Riley wrote:
i think a deeper more film like tonality has something to do with it too
additional sheens and shines take that flatness away


True, though even pure matte paper has tremendous depth. I've printed some large format architectural shots on matte paper and gotten a really beautiful sense of depth.

That is what I'd like to know too

Although there are no absolute answers to this question, I'm surprised that nobody have mentioned colours related to composition here. Many of the technical sides mentioned in this thread are part of what works, but it's a well established truth within most forms of visual art, that some colours seem closer (warm reds in particular) and some seem more distant (cool blues).

Brent's excellent river bend on page four of this thread is a good example. The red in the background pushes the cliff and the river forward, making them coming "out of the frame".

Edited by zakk9 on Apr 27, 2007 at 08:56 AM GMT

jrn813 wrote:
I Think All Aspects Of A Photograph Contribute To The 3D Effect...
DOF, Color, Contrast, Saturation, Resolution, And Sharpness, Are All Factors...

Small Point, But I Believe I Did Mention Color....

And This Also Proves That Point... 3D In 3D

Thanks all, keep going. I will be away from my computer for a couple of days...

There seem to be two unrelated discussions going on here: there's no mystery about contriving a scene in which one element 'pops out of the foreground': it's purely a function of DOF and contrast. Large format images simply have less DOF, hence the mojo.

The deeper and more interesting question addresses what's going on when two lenses shoot an identical scene with the same lighting at the same focal length and aperture, yet one more vividly depicts a plausible sense of 3D space, or plasticity. As has been suggested, this appears to be something of a black art identifiable by German (especially Zeiss) glass.

To me the quality is akin to what audiophiles, in similar pursuit of fidelity to reality, call 'presence' – valve amps and high sensitivity speakers do the trick. Whatever the knack is, it seems easier to achieve with longer than shorter lenses. At 28mm there are many fine lenses but the Canon, Nikon and Olympus models give results that look like photographs shot with fine lenses; with Zeiss and Leica it's like being there.

However, the phenomenon is visible in the digital realm, so we might begin by following Adobe's original Photoshop maxim about edges and transitions. If you look at these 600% crops taken from a lens that has the mojo (Zeiss 28mm, right) and one that doesn't (Canon 17-40, left) you'll notice that the Zeiss describes transitions between strongly contrasting colours in fewer pixels, and that every one of those pixels is more strongly defined: the mid-tones particularly are spread apart, polarised more strongly towards lights and darks, and have greater luminosity.

It would have been nice if the differences I mentioned had survived the transition to the web . . . sorry about that!

The 3-D look is difficult to see unless you are told that the image was made with a Leica. Then it just pops right out at you.

IMO it's the other way round. 3D is about the only thing Leica lenses do less well. It has nothing to do with DoF and a sharp subject surrounded by smooth bokeh. That is another thing altogether. The wonderful bluebells picture a few pages back on the Alternative Image thread has buckets of 3D effect but nil differential focus. Same for jrn's lovely rusty boxes. I agree with Bathman's selection. To my eye, some of the images being put forward on this thread as examples have strong differential focus but almost no 3D effect at all. It is a very subtle thing.

Thanks Hubsand, just saw your post, that is interesting. However do you still see the differnce when printed, when scaled. Do MF digital picturs have more of the 3D?

off to the mountains...