Just about Photography

This article is written by me based on my experience using fisheye lens, I hope it is useful for you. Maybe some tips/ technique just good for several cases ~ I think it’s difficult to write the perfect ways to use the tool in every condition and situation, it should be have limitation and exception for some conditions. Anyway you can try to experiment by yourself and I am sure the best way to know how to use the tool (lens) isn’t only read but also try, try and try.

Here is some tips how to use fisheye lens creatively:

1. Try to get repetitive pattern in your photo as much as possible ~ simple pattern will become interesting when you use fisheye lens. You can see two examples below, I think the pattern looked more interesting hehe….

2. Too messy and crowded?! why not….. Sometimes when you play with fisheye lens its interesting to take some (crowded) activities such as traffic jam or people who getting rush in train station or (maybe) people do business in market ~ everything that looked messy and crowded will become an interesting combination. See the photo below, I took this photo on the top roof of building and can see construction project with old building far away, in addition I also can see many cars in the left side. Anyway it’s not a regular pattern but a combination of many pattern ~ totally different with tips #1.

3. Try to take photo in a “crazy” way. If you ready to use fisheye lens means that you ready to accept lens distortion. When someone buy fisheye lens, actually he buy “distortion” – seems like distortion is the important value for fisheye lens. But in fact some people try to avoid too much distortion in his photo – for some cases I agree but if you use it’s ability to produce “crazy” distortion – definetly you will surprise when you see the photo. The example below is an example to prove that the world is round hehe…..

4. Use open wide aperture to empasize something in your photo. When using fisheye lens people seldom to use open wide aperture, people usually use large number f  (ex: f/16) to make sure that everything in the photos are sharp. I agree with that opinion but sometimes when you need to emphasize something maybe you can try to use maximum aperture. See the example below, in this example I want to emphasize the curve shape of the (front) fence ~ it looked like a (window) frame which the blurred pattern as an object behind it.

5. Try to take photo from different position and distance. When you use fisheye lens don’t forget to change your position and distance with the object. You can’t think that position is not good without try it ~ when using fisheye lens the close object to the camera will produce the object bigger (sometimes it makes the object large inproperly). See examples below, even with the same object the different is much (maybe) when you change your position.

6. Rotate your camera to get amazing photo. In previous tips I usually rotate the camera almost facing the earth/ground. In tips #6 I give you examples when you rotate the camera facing the sky – the results also not bad or better (maybe) hehe……

That’s all – I hope this article useful for you – comments, suggestions, critiques are welcome. Thanks for visiting this website.