Shooting from different angles.

We are accustomed to see the world from two viewpoints: when standing or walking and when sitting down.
When using a camera, it’s only natural that we take our pictures from the same positions - a pity!

Getting down on one’s knees may dramatically change the perspective.

When photographing animals or children, the resulting photos tend to look more “natural” and in landscape photography, it is often possible to include details that give you a dramatic” foreground, such as stones or an old tree stump. This works best with an extreme wide-angle lens (24 mm and below) that allows you to get very close to an object while including a huge background.

On the other hand, when photographing buildings, we often get much better pictures when we t find a higher place to shoot from. Simply standing on the ground and inclining our head (and the camera) we will get the dreaded “falling lines” - unless we own a special so-called “shift lens that can correct this.

When neither solution works, often the best option is to use the falling lines as an artistic element which means pronouncing the effect even more by using a wide-angle - and getting down on our knees again.

By the way: it is interesting that we do not tend to realise this without a camera! Our brain corrects the images received from the eyes t a certain degree, but this doesn’t work with a two-dimensional photograph.

This also explains why “breathtaking” views from above may look “flat” and uninspiring as a photo!

How to take good travel photos