Distorting Reality

When I first started studying photography, I learned about the effects that various focal lengths had on a scene. Wide angle lenses give prominence to closer subjects while shrinking distant features into tiny objects. On the other hand, telephoto lenses compress a scene, making subjects that are far apart appear next to each other, and fooling the eye with scale. It wasn’t until I started experimenting with many different focal lengths that I really understood what this meant. Here are two examples from opposite ends of the focal length spectrum.

Mt. St. Helens from the lahar or ash flow that destroyed the Toutle River Valley in the eruption of 1980, Mt. St. Helens National Monument
Mt. St. Helens from the lahar or ash flow that destroyed the Toutle River Valley in the eruption of 1980, Mt. St. Helens National Monument

The image above was captured at the 35mm film equivalent of a 16mm focal length. Here, the foreground rocks and flowers are rendered quite large, while the massive volcano of Mt. St. Helen’s is shrunken into the background. The wide angle emphasizes the distance between the foreground and the horizon, seeming to stretch them apart.

A view of a Palo Alto home includes the city of San Mateo in the midground and San Francisco in the background.  The view is compressed using a long telephoto lens.
A view of a Palo Alto home includes the city of Redwood Shores in the midground and San Francisco in the background. The view is compressed using a long telephoto lens.

The photo above shows the opposite effect. It was captured at the 35mm film equivalent of a whopping 1280mm. I took the photo in Palo Alto, CA, about a quarter of a mile from the house in the foreground. The buildings of Redwood Shores (Oracle headquarters) appear as if they are directly behind the house, when in fact they are 15 miles away. At the top of the photo can be seen the buildings of downtown San Francisco, which is 40 miles from the house. The extreme telephoto squashes this distance between subjects so that they appear stacked on top of each other. This same effect has been seen in countless photos of the moon rising from behind buildings or a giant sun rising over an African landscape.

Bishop Creek Waterfall (Photo of the week)

Water cascades down the south fork of Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA
Water cascades down the south fork of Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA

This week’s photo was a tough choice for me. I couldn’t decide if I liked the photo above, or the photo below better. I shot the first photo as I came upon the scene, exploring the best angles from which to capture this waterfall. I loved how the roots of the bush on the left seemed to break the granite into small slabs, so I moved in close to simplify the scene, resulting in the second photo.

A root system grows from broken granite, Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA
A root system grows from broken granite, Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA

After much deliberation, I chose the first photo as my favorite for several reasons. Firstly, it is more of a layered photo, with several foreground elements stacking up to lead the eye easily to the upper waterfall. Secondly, it accentuates the fall colors a little more than the second photo. There are more trees included in the background, and since it was shot from a higher vantage point, there are more fall colors reflected in the pool between the upper and lower waterfalls. The second photo holds more tension because the root system really makes the eye travel around it and up the creek. Either way, I like them both.

As with any art, there is no “right” answer in photography (although there can be many wrong answers!)

Fall color reflection – which photo is better?

In today’s post, I present two images I took one after the other in the same location. Which one do you like better? Today you get to be the judge. Add your comments below (no registration of any kind necessary).

Silken water reflects the gold colors of fall, South Fork Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA
Silken water reflects the gold colors of fall, South Fork Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA
Water pours over rocks, South Fork Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA
Water pours over rocks, South Fork Bishop Creek, Inyo National Forest, CA

I was photographing along Bishop Creek when I came across the scene in the first photo. I was attracted to the aesthetics of the small ripple in the creek, and thought it would make a strong foreground element. There were slight color reflections in the water, and I loved how the water poured over the top of the rocks. After taking the shot, I realized that my foreground element was strong enough to stand alone as more of an abstract. So I moved closer, recomposed, and took the second photo.

So, which is the better photo? Tell us which you like better and why in the comments below.

Bristlecone At Sunset (Photo of the week)

An ancient bristlecone pine reflects the last rays of daylight, White Mountains, CA
An ancient bristlecone pine reflects the last rays of daylight, White Mountains, CA

On my recent trip to the eastern Sierra to photograph the fall colors, I visited the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest in the White Mountains, part of the Inyo National Forest. I had done some reading about the area from books such as David Muench’s classic Timberline Ancients (out of print), and several of Galen Rowell’s insightful essays from Vision and Inner Game of Outdoor Photography. But actually being there and walking among these trees was a spiritual experience, and one I will not soon forget.

We were blessed with a recent snow storm that blanketed the crest of the White Mountains – not enough to close the road, and just enough to provide a clean contrast to the rough, twisted texture of the bristlecone. We were working an exposed western-facing slope, and after taking a few establishing shots, I climbed to the top of the hill. I quickly remembered that I was at 11,500 feet in elevation, as I was out of breath after only a few steps! My goal in the photo above was to capture the vibrant colors of sunset reflected in the wood of the bristlecone, while also getting the colors in the opposite horizon, as well as the earth shadow as it crept across the eastern foothills and Nevada desert beyond. The warm pastels in the wood are continued in the sunset colors of the sky above.

All lengths of lens work here, depending on your personal style and vision – whether it is to shoot a distant mountain top grove with a telephoto, or to crawl up inside the gnarled spiral of a branch with a fish-eye. The challenge in shooting these trees is to try to decide what to include and what to leave out of the frame. One question I kept coming back to that helped me to focus was, “What is the main point of this photo?” If my answer was “the texture of this branch,” then why include the roots of the tree? If my answer was “to show the desolate environment in which these trees live,” then I knew to shoot wide and and treat an entire group of trees as the main subject.

Below are a few more photos I took while exploring the bristlecone forest.

A bristlecone log frames an upright tree, both of which have lived for thousands of years, White Mountains, CA
A bristlecone log frames an upright tree, both of which have lived for thousands of years, White Mountains, CA
A bristlecone pine grows from a desolate, snowy mountainside, White Mountains, CA
A bristlecone pine grows from a desolate, snowy mountainside, White Mountains, CA
Fresh snows blankets the slopes of the White Mountains, framing the ancient bristlecone pines that live there
Fresh snows blankets the slopes of the White Mountains, framing the ancient bristlecone pines that live there

Copyright 2017 Hank Christensen