Flat looking

Me too.

Flat in photography refers more than anything to low contrast
prints. It probably has a dozen uses.

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'flat' to me indicates a snap that is liefless and lacking vibrance/personality. A number of issuescan cause that. Lighting, DOF, colour, contrast

'flat' is nothing to do with distant perspective as produced by a long foocal length lens, IMO.

agreed!

My last post will win no awards for spelling or grammar

True enough but it's content was spot on - not that there are usually awards for that either. At least you have the excuse that it was posted at 5.20am. I wish I could type so well in my sleep

And if you compress something.... What does it become?????

Err!!!......... FLAT

http://fineartamerica.com/art/paintings/flat+perspective/all

"Conceptual perspective. Paintings which use conceptual perspective often look very flat, this technique can sometimes look like the perspective has gone wrong but it is simply another way of looking at the world around us."
http://www.museumnetworkuk.org/landscapes/text/textthemes/textperspective.htm

"Viewing Distortions. However, a perfect perspective drawing or optically flat photograph reproduces three dimensional space on the viewer's retina only when we view it with a single eye, located at the center of projection and looking along the correct direction of view implied by the perspective geometry."


"The American photographer Ansel Adams had a superb eye for perspective facts in visual design. His photograph of an arid landscape contains not one straight edge anywhere, and confronts the world head on, making the landscape appear flat. Yet the sense of depth in space is powerful and pervasive."

http://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/perspect1.html#fourfacts

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it's true... here's pamela anderson shots side by side, 100mm and 28mm lenses she is clearly flatter in the 100mm shot.

Your right Don.... her nose looks very flat!

My only concern is that the left shot is your
standard portrait lens

I supose both realy, Im trying to gain as much info as possible to clarify the term in my own mind. I origanaly thought the term meant a soft look to the portrait. Thanks for the feed back guys there is much to ponder over.

Ian,

That depends on how much you compress it, it might be just a bit squashed

Either way, you have to have separate terms which describe both flat lighting and compressed perspective otherwise it leads to confusion.

This is the ultimate flat picture....

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Hogarth-satire-on-false-pespe...

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We can learn a lot about perspective from art. So how did painters know what a wide angle or telephoto effect would be? Apart from anything else such as imagination or aliens, they used cameras. The camera obscura predates photography and can of course project an image onto a flat surface. This can be used as a guide, and was.

M C Escher is also an interesting souce of ideas.

Good film you pointed out in the other thread Ken about
William Kleine, but he pointed out that the telephoto
shots in Rome were "FLAT" Are you going to write
into the Beeb and complain that he's been getting the
definition wrong for the past 50 years.... Ha! Ha!

Also point out that he didn't need to go in so close
into peoples faces with a 35/50mm he could have stood
accross the road with a 135/200mm and got the same shots

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Couldn't help remember this shot taken in a local pub. Three of the girls look 3D, while the girl on the left has a face that looks decidedly flat

https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/644095_482881485067186_1596910493_n.jpg