On 12 Feb 2003 at 7:47, I wrote: > I own Capturing the Moment, the Newseum's collection of all > Pulitzer-prize-winning photos from the 1940s to the late 1990s. In > several of the photos that had been shot in crowded scenes with a 20 > or a 24, there is no tell-tale line convergence or curvature at the > edges. That tells me these photos were cropped.
Rob Studdert replied: Hi Paul, If images from your wide angle lenses are exhibiting curvature at the edges then they are poor lenses (I'm assuming that this is how you derived your opinion?). Perspective distortion will render straight lines straight wherever they lie in the frame. If a scene is shot wide where all subjects in the frame are a distance away (5 metres plus) perspective distortion isn't very noticeable, only when subjects are up close (a metre or less for 20 or 24mm) does the perspective distortion become really apparent. Rob, It wasn't so much the absence of barrel distortion as the lack of the familiar "converging vertical lines" effect and elongate faces that you invariably find at the edges of a wide-angle photo. The faces of people at the edges looked normal, and you'd be hard-pressed to find vertical lines that were slanted. [EMAIL PROTECTED]
