Tips for Perfecting Wide Angle Photos

One of the trickiest aspects of photography is using a wide angle lens.  With a wide angle lens, it more closely approximates the way we actually see the world.  Most of us can see a little bit on each side of any scene.  A wide angle lens is great for capturing landscapes, and sometimes people use the “fish eye” wide angle lens to take photos of real estate.

Let’s explore how to make great wide angle shots:

Fill the Frame

When you look through the viewfinder, ensure that every part of the frame is full of what you want to show in the shot.  You don’t want to have to cut and edit it later, which kind of ruins the whole idea of a wide angle shot.

Watch Your Colours

The wide angle causes some of the lines in your image to curve.  This can cause some distortion in the image, so you need to be very careful with colours to ensure that the distortion looks good and captures what you wanted in the shot.

Capture the Crowd

Wide angle lenses are fabulous for taking a shot of a large group of people, such as graduation or wedding photos, or other crowd shots.  Look carefully at what is showing in the viewfinder, such as checking for shadows over people’s faces, before taking the shot.

Cityscapes

The wide angle lens is the best thing to use to get good shots of large cityscapes and structures, such as the London skyline or The Golden Gate Bridge.  This will help capture all the important elements to get the scene right.  Pay close attention to the foreground in the viewfinder, to ensure you get the shot you want.

Use Distortion

As mentioned before, the lines in an image curve with a wide angle lens.  You can use this distortion to add amazing effects to your images.  Alternatively, you can eliminate as much distortion as you want by ensuring you are pointing the camera completely straight ahead.

The Sky Is Your Friend

When using a wide angle lens for nature photography, make a large portion of your image, the sky, for a very interesting effect on your main feature, below.

Keep People Away from Sides

As the sides of your image in the viewfinder are apt to curve, shoot people away from the sides and corners of the shot.  Put them more to the middle of the photo.

Using these tips will help you take amazing photos with a wide angle lens.  Take a lot of different shots with the wide angle lens to discover how the effects look.  Try some vertical shots, some from below and some from above, to see how the lines are affected.