A 3D effect in the image or just my imagination ?

[NickTrop]

Incidentally, a terrific way to study many of these techniques in action (literally!) is to watch great old black-and-white movies. Their directors and cinematographers were masters at creating a sense of depth through texture, lighting, and perspective.

Yes... started a thread (more general) here on this:
http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=47477

While what you say is certainly true, a lot of the films from the 30's were using very low speed film, with actors under very hot studio lights... they shot using wider apertures and shallower depth of field less for "aesthetic" reasons. Imagine if your only choices of film speeds were black and white and a 10 ASA and a 25 ASA? Lot more "3D" effect - intentional and (mostly) "otherwise". I'm sure the basics you allude to is not lost on any modern cinematographer. But they have higher speed emulsions at their disposal.

 

[vrgard]

I haven't had a chance yet to digest all that's been posted since my posting above but based on a very quick read there does seem to be some congruence in our thoughts. What I'm alluding to is that after my previous posting I was thinking more about this subject and realized that I had failed to point out that a likely signficant contributor to this 3D effect, in addition to the possible benefits of proper perspective and possibly even being the prime contributor, is the limited depth of field causing a more stark separation between subject and surrounding/background.

I also wanted to say thank you to the various posters in this thread. It's really nice to be able to have a dialogue about such things without it devolving to an argument.

-Randy

 

[alexz]

BTW, once torning between 35mm lens choices recently to compliment my 50mm FL between Biogom ZM, 'Cron 35mm v4 and 'Cron ASPH, I finally made up my mind for the latter one while one of the most improtant considerations was the fact of more harsh OOF transition the ASPH provides comparative to the former two, according to what I noticed on numerious examples shot with noted lenses. I noticed a bit sharper transition from in-focus to OOF as provided by ASPH (an any given aperture) contributes greatly to that 3D look - somethign that thrilled me instantly..

 

[ywenz]

I'll play the fake 3D game..

this one is 3D as hell:

 

[vrgard]

Wow, ywenz, it sure is. Perhaps it's the best example yet of what I was referring to. Namely, that the 3D effect is caused more by depth of field and everything (particularly the background) but the plane of focus being out of focus rather than simply a matter of maintaining proper perspective. In ywenz's shot there's no diminishing line in the Z axis heading off to any point of convergence (hope I got that terminology correct - it's been a while since I studied such things) yet the 3D effect is clearly apparent.

-Randy

P.S. Do I detect a trend here? More "3D" effect with female subjects? Wishful thinking on our parts? 😉

 

[Finder]

some causes for depth in an image:

Converging lines in linear perspective. Changes in scale are related.
Overlapping - foreground object in front of background object.
Aerial haze - things far away are not as clear. Depth of field is related to this as well.
Color shift from warm to cool - related to aerial haze in that atmosphere scatters longer wavelength easier than shorter ones.

 

[jlw]

Aerial haze - things far away are not as clear. Depth of field is related to this as well.
Color shift from warm to cool - related to aerial haze in that atmosphere scatters longer wavelength easier than shorter ones.

Hey, yeah, aerial perspective! I forgot to include that one in my previous laundry list of depth-enhancing techniques.

Anybody want to take a crack at producing an image that uses ALL of them?