Forced perspective and lens foreshortening: explanation and in session mini tasks Borrow a camera and go out and about around campus in groups of three and take some shots that demonstrate these two different techniques (details below). Try to be creative, imaginative and amusing with your ideas. Mini task 1) Take some shots using the ‘forced perspective’ technique. Tips on shooting forced perspective shots: 1) Use a small aperture (f8 or higher) so both foreground and background are in crisp focus. This will help fool the eye that distant object and near objects are at the same distance from the camera. 2) Compose things so foreground objects and background objects appear as if they are interacting with each other. 3) Stand back from your foreground objects and zoom in a little. 4) Use a well-lit area so you can use a small aperture and a reasonably fast shutter speed. Examples of forced perspective taken from Flickr Mini task 2) Shots using ‘lens foreshortening’. Also take some shots firstly zoomed OUT but close to the primary subject, but with a distant subject also in the shot. Then walk away from your foreground object and zoom IN, so your foreground subject is about the same size as before. What has happened to the distant subject? (See Kermit pictures below) Also try some wide angle foreshortening (zoom OUT to about 20mm or less) Tips on shooting foreshortened shots: 1) Aperture is less critical for telephoto foreshortening but for the wide-angle techniques try to choose a small setting (f8 or higher) so both foreground and background are in crisp focus. 2) For telephoto foreshortening get well back and zoom-in to your foreground subject if you wish to bring the appearance of the background closer. Some examples of WIDEANGLE foreshortening here (from Flickr). These are probably at about 10mm and shooting in portrait has exaggerated the foreshortening further: Some examples of telephoto foreshortening here: Left, camera close to subject (Kermit) at about 20mm (so like the shots above in many ways). Right, a long way from subject but zoomed in on telephoto (about 200mm in this example). The shrub behind is no closer – it just seems that way. The helicopter has been brought ‘closer’ to the car using foreshortening. A very good explanation of foreshortening here: http://tomjungphotography.blogspot.co.uk/2011_08_28_archive.html Paul Hazell .