Lens Compression Explained: How to Control Depth & Perspective in Photography
I’ve been fascinated by the concept of lens compression for about six months. I wanted to learn not just what it is and how it works. More importantly, I wanted to learn how I might use it in my photography. My biggest challenge was finding the time and location to demonstrate of it with my own shots. I needed a spot that had a place to set up a subject, obviously. But it also had to have a distinctive background that would look different with the different lenses. The edge of the woods wouldn’t do for that.
This morning while I was out running my errands, I had planned to go to a pier and use the park for the shots. On the way, however, I passed a spot in Daphne called the Alligator Boardwalk. I’d been there before with my boys, and I realized it was the perfect location for this project.
When we think of using a zoom lens to get closer to our subject, it doesn’t really occur to us that other things are happening inside that cylinder of stuff. I’m going to show you today what all happens when you swap out a lens, and then I’ll talk about the implications of all that.
What is Lens Compression?
Lens compression is a visual effect where the elements in the background look like they’re closer to the subject when we use longer focal lengths. It isn’t the lens itself that causes this to happen, it’s the distance between the camera and the subject. It’s a result of the distortion of perspective, which happens when subjects are viewed from different distances. Zoom or telephoto lenses exaggerate compression by forcing the photographer to stand farther from the subject. That makes the things behind the subject seem like they’re larger and closer to the subject. Wide-angle lenses, which we use for landscapes, do the opposite. They emphasize depth, and the things in the background look smaller and farther away. I use a wide-angle lens when I want to create a sense of space and openness.
Prime lenses, or fixed lenses, don’t zoom. They provide a field of view that is closer to what we see with our eyes. If you want to show things as they are, with regard to perspective and depth perception, you want to use a prime lens. I have a “nifty-fifty” 50 mm prime lens that I use for some of my travel photography and nature shots.
Telephoto or zoom lenses flatten the scene by making the background elements look larger and closer. Subjects stand out against the background. I use my zooms for my nature photography, where I want to isolate the subject from its background.
Let’s Talk about Perspective and Compression
Perspective is determined by the physical distance between the camera and the subject. When we change perspective, we alter how the foreground and the background elements relate to each other. Moving closer to the subject exaggerates depth, and moving farther away compresses it.
Compression is a result of perspective, but we really only see it with longer focal lengths using the zoom lenses. It doesn’t really change the fundamental perspective of the scene. However, it can affect how we perceive the overall space of it.
Examples of Lens Compression
To illustrate what happens with different lenses, I started out by setting up my tripod and putting my phone on it to create a static subject. As I took the photos with the different lenses, I did my best to keep the subject the same size in the viewfinder. That way, the major differences would all be in the way the background appeared.
Wide-angle Lens
Remember that the wide-angle lens works best for landscapes, and it’s the lens of choice for architecture and real estate. It preserves the depth of the scene. When we look at this image, that’s what we’re seeing. I didn’t do a great job of focusing, but you can see that the highway overpass looks like it’s a long way off, and the trees look maybe 20 paces away from the tripod.
“Nifty-fifty”
When I changed to my 50 mm prime lens, it’s a whole different view. If you look at the bottom of the picture, you see the seam in the concrete, the tripod is in the same spot. But look how much closer everything in the background looks! Now the trees look like they’re about ten paces away, and the wooden bridge that we could barely see with the wide-angle lens now looks like it’s about 25 paces away.
The “Kit” Lens
A “kit” lens is just a lens that comes with the camera. Not all cameras bundle a lens with the body, but a lot do. When I switched to my kit lens, I didn’t use any zoom action. I left it at 24 mm, but in order to keep the subject the same size in the pictures, I had to move farther away from it. That kind of pushed the trees and the bridge back away from the tripod.
Mid-range Zoom Lens
I kind of cut off the bottom of the tripod in this shot, but I promise you I never moved the tripod. The only thing I moved in the shots was me. The 60 mm zooming brought it all in close again. If you compare it with the Nifty-fifty shot, everything’s a lot closer – especially that highway overpass.
My Best “Small” Zoom Lens
At 190 mm of zoom, everything is just a few steps away from me. What a huge difference from the wide-angle lens, where it seemed as if everything was really spread out – which is closer to the truth of the path. If you were to see this image and think that you could see the whole tour in just a few minutes, you’d realize how much the compression affects our perception of reality.
Choosing the Right Lens for Desired Compression
This exercise has been extremely educational for me, because it helps explain why some of my photos have turned out differently than I thought they would. What do we learn from this? If you want to put a lot of distance between your subject and the background, stay close and use as little zoom as possible. If you want to bring the background in closer to the subject, use the zoom and back away from the subject.
Understanding lens compression is going to be helpful when you are able to take your time and carefully compose your shot. If you’re depending on luck, and let’s face it, sometimes we have to, you may not be able to swap lenses as quickly as you’d like to. One example of having to rely on whatever you consider to be your most versatile lens is driving through Cades Cove in the Smoky Mountains. You never know if you’re going to see a bear 50 feet away or a coyote 10 feet away, and you can’t always stop the vehicle to get the right shot.
Your Turn
I’d love to hear what you thought of this experiment. I don’t have to remember exactly the details of the shots, just that zooming will compress the whole shot front-to-back. Now that I’ve laid it out for you and shown you exactly how it works, give it a try for yourself. If you’d like me to go deeper on any photography subject, drop a comment. I’ll use it as a lesson plan for my own education, and then I’ll share what I find with you!
If you’d like to read some more on lens compression, I found a couple of articles for you:
Lens Compression | What is it and How Does it Affect Your Photography? – Adorama
What is Lens Compression and How to Use It In Your Photos
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