It might seem like one of the simplest parts of photography: leveling your horizon. Most photographers want their horizons to be straight, of course, but this isn’t an area of photography that gets too much attention. And why would it? Leveling the horizon is a very easy task — right? In practice, though, it requires more care than many people think. You can’t just rely on your camera’s “virtual horizon,” or your post-processing software’s “auto straighten” tool. Our perception of a level horizon is more complicated than that.
Is your tripod a little off the level? Just tell people it’s a Dutch Angle
The Dutch Angle. It’s one of those things you either love or you hate, and even when you are a fan, it can sometimes be difficult to distinguish between an intentional act and whether the creator simply forgot to level their tripod.
It’s one of those things I’ve tended to avoid, having never really seen a purpose for it in my own work. This study from Fandor, however, takes us through some of Cinema’s best scenes ranging from 5 to a full 90 degrees, showing us the angles that we probably didn’t even notice until it was pointed out to us.
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