Tilt-Shift Lenses

A Primer for Image Control Freaks

ByAllan Weitz

When it comes to creative control, it's handy to be able to tinker with the laws of optics when the need arises, and that's what tilt-shift lenses enable you to do. By rotating, tilting, and/or shifting the forward section of the lens, tilt-shift optics enable you to selectively expand or reduce the plane-of-focus as well as reposition the subject within the frame from a fixed camera position.

And while you might argue you can digitally correct optical distortions and tinker with selective-focus in Photoshop, the degree to which you can control the optical dynamics of a photograph is far greater when captured in-camera with a tilt-shift lens. If you've ever shot with a view camera say amen.

Tilt-shifts are available in wide, normal, and short-telephoto focal lengths from Nikon (24/3.5D, 45/2.8D, and 85/2.8D ) and Canon (24/3.5 TS-E, 45/2.8 TS-E and 90/2.8 TS-E). For shooting in tight interiors, tall structures, and dramatic still life imagery Canon has introduced a 17/4L TS-E ultra-wide tilt-shift lens. For landscape, architectural, interior, and industrial photographers, this ultra-wide tilt-shift lens should prove to be liberating from both logistical and creative points-of-view.

For architectural shooters, tilt-shift lenses render buildings without the inherent keystone distortions that occur when you aim cameras skyward. By keeping the camera level and shifting the forward section of the lens upwards, parallel lines remain parallel, and optical distortions are greatly reduced if not totally eliminated. The following images, taken with a tripod-mounted Nikon D3X and a 24/3.5D tilt-shift Nikkor lens from a fixed position, illustrate the value of lens-shift in architectural photography.

Note- Because of the complexity of their design, tilt-shift lenses are manual focus only.

In the top photo the camera is level horizontally, but tilted skyward to capture the top of the building. In the middle picture, taken with the lens facing dead-ahead, the perspective is rendered correctly, but the top half of the building is out of frame. By shifting the forward section of the lens upward while keeping the camera body parallel to the building, the top of the building shifts into the frame without introducing keystone distortions. You might say the lens is standing on its 'tippy-toes'.

Tilt-Shift lenses are also quite effective at increasing (or decreasing) the degree of focus between objects close and far within a picture. The images below were taken from the same position with a Nikon D3X and a Nikkor 24/3.5D tilt-shift lens set at its widest aperture, and focused on the fence cap in the lower foreground. By tilting the lens downward on its vertical axis, it was possible to bring both the foreground and background into focus simultaneously even at the lens' widest aperture. Similarly, the photos of the red sled leaning against a white picket fence show the effects of swinging the lens left and right across the horizontal plane.

Tilt-shift lenses are also quite handy in studio environs. As a category, tilt-shift lenses are recognized as being sharp, and in the case of the 85 and 90 mm lenses from Nikon and Canon, can focus down to half life-size (1:2), making them invaluable for photographing small, multi-dimensional objects in great detail.

The toy racecar, captured from a child's head-squished-against-the-carpet point-of-view, was taken with a Canon EF 24/3.5 tilt-shift lens mounted on a Canon 1Ds Mark II. Maintaining focus across the entire length of the 7" toy car at close range (12") would be near impossible with a conventional 24 mm lens, even when stopped down to its minimum aperture.

By simply swinging the front section of the 24/3.5 TS-E to a position more parallel to the side of the toy made it possible to bring the entire toy into focus without need of stopping the lens down. It was then a matter of stopping down to f/11 to bring the entire width of the car into focus. If not for the nifty ability of tilt-shift lenses to 'bend the rules of focus', it would require a larger-format view camera (and far-pricier digital capture back) to achieve similar results.

Though tested on a full-frame DSLR, tilt-shift lenses work equally well with compact, APS-C format DSLRs. Depending on the magnification factor of your particular camera (1.5x on Nikon and 1.6x on Canon compact DSLRs), a 24 mm tilt-shift lens emulates the field-of-view of a 36 to 38.4 mm lens on a full-frame DSLR. Likewise a 45 mm tilt-shift emulates a 67 to 72 mm lens, and the 85/90 mm lenses emulate 127.5 to 136 mm and 135 to 144 mm lenses respectively. And in case you're curious, the new Canon 17/3.5 TS-E on a Canon compact DSLR works out to a 27.2 mm lens.