I have always said the perspective we see does exactly and only depend on "point of view" as you say it. Nothing wrong with saying point of view, but for photos, I say it as the view depends on where where we stand to view it (that being what we can actually control). Stand someplace else and we see a different point of view, and a different perspective (relationship among scene features). The lens standing in either place with us can only capture the view that it sees in front of it. The lens cannot change the view to show something different.
Yes, it is what you said, but it's still wrong, then and now. The lens cannot and does not affect perspective. When we stand at a certain place, we see a view, and the camera captures that same view. It is all the lens can do, it reproduces the scene in front of it. Any lens there (of whatever focal length) will see the same view and the same perspective. Simply because that is where we chose to stand to view it.
Yes the lens choice may cause different borders around it.
I know you cannot get past the borders, but I am speaking of the perspective, the spatial relationship of the objects in the scene, those we can see inside the borders.No, the focal length just magnifies, and crops a frame to put a border around the image we see, but it does not change what is seen when standing in that place, perspective wise. Any lens can only see the same view there, meaning perspective, not meaning size of frame around it.
Yes, focal length does of course affect where we think we must stand, but it is the distance of where we stand that affects perspective. The lens does not change the scene to affect perspective. Where we stand affects perspective.
To claim a 200 mm lens causes a certain perspective is simply wrong, since we can stand another place and get the opposite effect. So which is it?
See the pictures in #6 of this thread, showing the lens causes no difference in perspective. Where we stand with it is the only perspective effect.
You can stand any place you choose, and changing your position does change the view you see there, and its perspective (relative to other things in the same scene).
The pictures you posted of the girl in front of the building...
Standing back 100 feet from the girl (with any lens) makes the girl smaller, and thus the building behind appear large and close, relative to the girl. We might call that compression, but the distance does it, NOT the lens.
Standing only 6 feet from the girl (with any lens) makes the girl larger, and thus the building behind be far and small and insignificant. This is the opposite of compression, depending only on where we stand. With any lens. Including the SAME lens.
All any lens can do is to capture what it sees when standing there. The lens CANNOT change the perspective that we see standing there. We humans tend not to notice the perspective, until we freeze it into a frame. But it is there, nevertheless, if we just look, and notice.
It is true that the 400mm lens at 100 feet, or the 24m lens at 6 feet, does make the photo situations more convenient (which is a magnification and cropping thing, which you confuse with perspective), but the focal length CANNOT change the perspective seen when standing there. The view is simply what it is, if there. The camera lens sees the same scene we see. Magnification and cropping cannot change the perspective (OK, some cases could crop out certain features that cause us to not see the perspective effects, but the lens cannot change the perspective of where we stand).
I am often guilty of your same error, by saying the flash does this, or the flash does that in certain situations. Of course, the flash never does anything but to flash as it is told to do. The situation circumstances, of ambient, distance, bounce, etc, they cause relationship differences, but all the flash ever does is flash.
And all the lens ever does is to reproduce the scene in front of it.
I think realizing these obvious things helps understanding of how to use them. Understanding is more useful than attributing results to magic.
There are of course other properties such as depth of field, which are also NOT to be confused with perspective.
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