I hate this thread! Just something else to want that I can't afford Seriously, some great shots. I wish I knew more about these lenses. It seems they can do some pretty unique things.
DynaSport wrote:
I hate this thread! Just something else to want that I can't afford ;) Seriously, some great shots. I wish I knew more about these lenses. It seems they can do some pretty unique things.
Dan
Do a search on all the forums, do a google search--there is a lot out there about tilt/shift. A lot of it is about movements with view cameras, but it is applicable. Also--try Ansel Adams 'The Camera'--good info there. I have a nmber of links that are helpful if you are interested.
Xavier Rival wrote:
search for this one in the future. By the way, your pano is great!
I remember reading a webpage about the creation of panos using T/S lenses, but lost it. Would anyone know about such a link ? (I am sure I found the original link somewhere here).
mh2000 wrote:
I find in shooting my TS-E 45 that I make use of the movements all the time for very subtle tweaks... not the dramatic ones most often shown. When you start shooting one of these lenses you start noticing how almost all photos can be made slightly better by either controlling your plane of focus or your perspective choice. Regarding how you want your axes alligned... well, either way it's going to be wrong sometimes. I've left mine as shipped and it seems to be right more often than not for me. The FSU Super-Rotators give complete flexiblity in movement and I plan on buying one of those at some point... though I'll probably get the TS-E 90 first. Regarding setup/usage, metering goes away with any movement, period. It's not that well publicized, but you pretty much have to shoot manually... make your settings prior to movements or just use a handheld meter. Sunny-16 works fine for me outdoors and I use my lens handheld for candids all the time using the movements. Excellent fun lens!...Show more →
The only super-rotators I'm aware of are from Hartblei and are available from a few places on the internet including www.hartblei.com and www.kievcamera.com.
The super-rotators are so named due to the fact that there is both a main rotation that turns the whole lens and a 2nd rotating joint between the tilt and shift that allows the user to change the orientation of shift relative to tilt. There are stops every so often (different for 35mm and MF lenses) but basically the shift can be any angle to tilt.
The Canon TS-E's are fixed from the factory with the tilt axis at 90 (or 270) degrees to shift. Either Canon service or a relatively handy owner can change this so that the tilt and shift go the same directions (or 180 degrees apart). I wouldn't want to change this very often and it probably should not be done in the field. The entire canon lens can be turned 90 degrees left or right but not round and round like the super rotators.
Brian, check out the Canon angle finder "C". It's a miracle worker. Not that well made and rather over-priced but it works wonders for the visually handicapped liked myself. Doesn't make me any smarter though.
There is also a model from Minolta I believe that works as well as an eyepiece extender from Nikon that can be made to fit. Have to search for info.
picnic wrote:
Do a search on all the forums, do a google search--there is a lot out there about tilt/shift. A lot of it is about movements with view cameras, but it is applicable. Also--try Ansel Adams 'The Camera'--good info there. I have a nmber of links that are helpful if you are interested.
Thanks, I'll have to do that. Next I'll need the web site of how to afford one ;0
I am going to have to get one at some point though.
You might be surprised how effective longer lenses are for landscapes. Many people automatically gravitate to wide angles for landscapes but IMHO some of the very best shots are taken with long lenses from further back. The compressed perspective can be very effective. While the 90 certainly can't be considered long, it will create a very different image than one taken with the 45 or 24. Besides, Wyoming is a big place and has lots of room to take a couple of steps backward.
I agree, I first bought my 17-40 for landscapes and while I love it I have found myself using my 150 just as much or more when doing landscapes, the compressed perspective pano look of the longer lenses can be very attractive. I also find it easier to compose when using a longer lens, for obvious reasons, sometimes there is just too much going on in the picture when using a wide lens, they can be really tricky sometimes. Still that being said there is nothing like a good dramatic wide angle shot!
joekraft wrote:
Does anyone have any idea why the tilt shift effects make things look like miniatures so often? I don't get it
It's not the shift effect that makes things look miniature. The shift (technically rise, fall, and shift -- in view camera parlance) moves the front lens element in parallel with the sensor plane, thereby moving a different part of the image circle over the sensor. This allows you to take pictures up at buildings and down at the street without angling the camera and getting convergence. In other words you can shift your horizon up to the top of your image or down to the bottom (or shift the midline left and right) without moving your camera -- this keeps your sensor parallel to the vertical lines out there in the world and avoids convergence.
Now shift may play a small role in the miniature effect, simply because we expect buildings to converge when we shoot up or down at them -- the lack of convergence gives much more realism and pleasing geometry, but in the right context can also make things look like scale models. (Parenthetically architectural photographers can use the opposite effect to make scale models look like real buildings).
The tilt is what creates the effect you're noticing. This is caused by changing the angle of the front lens element relative to the sensor. Normally the field of focus (where we describe the near and far boundaries of the DOF) is parallel to the sensor plane. So in whatever part of your image this field of sharpness begins and ends a fixed distance from the sensor.
But with tilt you're causing the field of focus to assume an angle. There's an optical principle called the Scheimpflug principle that describes how the angle forms when you change the angle of the front (or on view cameras the back) lens element.
Scroll down on this site to read a detailed review.
This tilt effect can be used to greatly increase your apparent depth of field (I say apparent because the actual depth doesn't change, only its angle). The classic example is trying to get the distant mountains and the foreground flowers in focus at the same time. Tilting the lens forward a tiny bit places both subjects the same (or similar) distance from the limits of the DOF.
Here are two examples of what slight forward tilt can do. The first shows comparison shots without (left) and with (right) tilt. Yes, I know I sort of missed the focus on the closest flower in the tilted shot, but with more attention that would easily have been in focus. Keep in mind I didn't change anything between these two shots other than the tilt and refocusing.
The second shot shows how you can get extremely sharp foreground and background detail by employing tilt. Note how both the plaque and the people in front of the church are in focus. I was about a foot from the plaque. There's no way you could do this without tilt. These lenses are used for tabletop macro photography (esp with the TS-E 90), like to get all the chess pieces in focus but not shoot from directly overhead.
And as I'm learning using a large format view camera, in which the DOF is very short you need to use tilt to get the important subjects in focus...(remember that 90mm is very wide on my 4x5 camera, it's comparable to about 18mm or so on an APS-C body!)
By the same token, you can use tilt to severely limit your DOF. You can swing and tilt the angle of focus (as per the Scheimpflug prinicple) to get things unpredictably out of focus. This is used in a gimmicky way for modeling shots, esp with the TS-E 90 (a better portrait lens). This is the technique I used above in the shot of the souvenir T-shirt stand under the Old South Meeting House in Boston, and the shot of the statue in the cloister at Trinity Church. The tilt makes things unpredictably out of focus, which is an effect you expect to see with the tiny tiny DOF you get when focusing very close to small things with a 100mm macro lens.
Finally, some shots that are just signature shift shots. In looking at these pictures think to yourself where the horizon is. Look to points of reference in the picture that are about my height (i.e. 5'10"). You may need to think about perspective drawing for a moment -- the horizon is always -- ALWAYS -- at your eye level. This means that if you hold the camera straight in front of your face, the horizon will bisect the picture right in the middle 100% of the time. Normally you need to move the camera to change that, but not with a TS lens or a view camera. In this next shot of the biker I've shifted down so much that the horizon is actually out of the picture!
This stuff is addictive. It's why I'm shooting large format now
I got my TS-E 24 from a user here for $900, like new in box.
I modified it myself to put the tilt and shift axes parallel to one another. But I wouldn't recommend that. Canon puts soft brass screws in, and I promptly stripped 3 of the 4.
Thankfully my father is a dentist, so he was able to drill out the stripped screws and I found sturdy replacements the right size at a hardware store.
DrPablo wrote:
I got my TS-E 24 from a user here for $900, like new in box.
I modified it myself to put the tilt and shift axes parallel to one another. But I wouldn't recommend that. Canon puts soft brass screws in, and I promptly stripped 3 of the 4.
Thankfully my father is a dentist, so he was able to drill out the stripped screws and I found sturdy replacements the right size at a hardware store.
Paul,
Jack Flesher recommends using a jewelers #00 Phillipshead instead of a hardware type that is chromed--the more usual type I guess. He says that using the jewelers screwdriver you won't strip the screws. Curious what you used as I"m getting ready to order the #00 from Micro-tools as per his recommendation http://www.outbackphoto.com/workflow/wf_42/essay.html
Thanks DrPablo, great explanation. I did some searching and found another link here but I am going to have to rent one of these to see how it physically shifts the lens. You aren't kidding it's addictive, just from looking at the shots on this post I am scheming how I can come up with a view camera or a medium format. Good grief
I just got the lens. There was a problem with ups since KEH wrote the wrong floor on my adress at work. I stayed like 15 minutes after work just in case it wold show up. When I walked in the elevator I met a man with a package. He went to the front desk in my office and asked for me. Lucky me! Now I have a whole weekend of new technology to learn. Will post in this fantastic thread as soon I get some good photos.
Watch out flowers, it is hunting season!
For those seek a cheaper alternative AND assuming that you just want a lens to do panos with you may want to try the 35mm PC-Nikkor. It just shifts and thus is nowhere near as flexible as the TS-E but it is a very good lens. I picked up one for less than $300 in VG shape and added another $20 for the Nikon to Canon adapter. Haven't done more than quick tests yet but it is quite sharp and probably the bargain lens for pano shooting.
Hrow wrote:
For those seek a cheaper alternative AND assuming that you just want a lens to do panos with you may want to try the 35mm PC-Nikkor. It just shifts and thus is nowhere near as flexible as the TS-E but it is a very good lens. I picked up one for less than $300 in VG shape and added another $20 for the Nikon to Canon adapter. Haven't done more than quick tests yet but it is quite sharp and probably the bargain lens for pano shooting.
That one has been talked about on the Alternative lens forum--looks like a good one to try. There are also the Hartbleis and Arax lenses for half or less than the Canons--even used. I tried to order a Hartblei 35mm superrotator but ran into a lot of snags and had no idea when I would get mine--so I opted to buy the Canon 45. In the meantime, Doug was able to get his MF Hartblei 45 (I think) and added an adaptor--which came out less than the Canon. I may consider that in the future.
Seriously, some great shots. I wish I knew more about these lenses. It seems they can do some pretty unique things.
