This exercise helped to explore how different focal lengths used in conjunction with a different viewpoint can change the perspective of a photograph. I took some shots of our budgie George in his cage at first standing back from the cage and using the longest focal length on my camera to zoom in:
The shot appears that you are standing just in front of the cage instead of a few meters back from it. As the focal length is long but you are stood away from the subject it still retains a lot of the depth of field. For the next shot I moved forwards to the cage and used the shortest focal length:
Although the length of the lens is much shorter, but moving towards the subject the framing is much tighter and you feel like you are right on top of the cage in terms of distance from it. the depth of field is a lot shallower and George stands out very well against his surroundings. using the shorter length has made the photograph feel much closer instead of further away.
The character of the photos differs in the detail they allow you to see. The first shot has a wider angle of view and makes George appear very small an insignificant in his cage, where as the second image makes him a very prominent feature and larger than usual in appearance. It makes his own character stand out more than the longer length shot.
its very important to consider what length lens to use when you are composing a shot. if you can get close up to a subject does not always mean you should step back and zoom in, nor does it mean you should get close and zoom out. it very much depends on how you want the subject to relate to the viewer and its background. In George’s case he appears much more his cheeky self where I have got close to him and used a shorter length lens to create a short depth of field to put the emphasis on the photo on him.
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