One of the nicest, most comprehensive explanations of tilt shift lenses on RU-vid! You can also use the tilt function in portrait photography to keep two different - but intersecting - focal planes in focus. An example would be a guitar player, who is holding their instrument so that the neck of the guitar is pointing roughly towards the camera. Normally. either the neck of the guitar or the players face would be in focus, but not both. But by adjusting the tilt so that the focal plane runs parallel to the guitar body, it is possible to keep both the players face, and the entire guitar, in sharp focus. This assumes that the players head is basically above the guitar body. Thanks for a great video, and best of luck in growing your channel!
Thanks for the video, Grant. I know I am late to the party, but I just wanted to say that this is probably the best explanation of tilt-shift lenses that I have seen.
I own a 24mm canon t&s, been on my camera 3 times, i need to get it out of my bag and put some miles on it, I learned something new about the three paint cans in focus, I was using the stacking method to get stuff like that in focus, this will change a lot, and the panoramic view I will try that this coming weekend.... wow... thanks for this video...
This was a very well done and easy to understand explanation of how to use a tilt-shift lens. I own a first-version Canon 24mm f/3.5 L tilt-shift lens and use it for shooting architecture and interior design photography. Thanks for a very well done video.
I haven’t used a tilt shift so I really appreciate what you’ve gone to the trouble of teaching us in this video. Your presentation and pedagogy is very good, I learned a lot. That’s the beauty of photography, it’s very long journey. 👏 thank you.
Excellent video. All my questions and curiosities were answered. You took all the unknowns and explained the benefits in a very easy to follow manner. Thank you.
Great explanation! I am using a 24mm TS-E and it's wonderful. The price is indeed very expensive but when you see how it's complicate to build this vs a classic prime lens and the small market, it's quite logic. Mine is a 2nd hand for about the half of the price.
If you want a cheap tilt-shift lens, Arax has a few really nices ones. They're completely manual, so no talking to the camera in any way, and they got them for several different mounts. I got their 28mm, and have had a lot of fun with it. I have it for the Pentax K-mount, and have now adapted it to the Samsung NX mount, and it's still fun for both photography and video.
Thanks Grant, I appreciate they way you explained this lens. I just got one and thought I knew what I was getting into and now I understand a lot better!
Great video on TS-e lenses. I started off renting the lenses and I’m now buying them. They have so many different uses and the image quality is amazing.
I used to drool over the Lindhoff camera, which exposed 3 x 120 frames at once in a single shot, their advertisment says “photograph all you can see”, it was fantastically expensive. Be nice if some company could make a digital bellows camera so you could tilt it every which way, they were commonplace in the ‘70s. The old style view cameras exposed directly onto a glass plate which you developed yourself. At the end of the day, the TS lens is the most cost effective solution compared to a dedicated bellows camera. I think Canon are releasing an RF version which has auto focus. The TS used in the video would be manual focus.
Thank you for this really illuminating and helpful video. I found it incredibly useful. I was also intrigued by the accessory you had on the camera hot shoe.
I'm glad you found it interesting. I hope I was able to answer all of your questions about the lens. I don't think I'll ever own one either, but it has been a lot of fun to rent.
Grant, stumbled on you as I was searching for videos on tilt-shift lenses. I thought you provided a lot of good information in a clear way. I have watched a few other videos and I 'm still confused between shift vs tilt. If I rotate the lens so that shift is on top for architecture photography, isn't that the same as using the tilt on top ? I'm not clear on how they each work differently. thx.
Clear and concise.🧐 I don't agree that these tilt-shift or perspective control lenses are 'ridiculous to own'. I just bought a Nikon 24 mm PC secondhand in nice condition. This can be used as an excellent (although relatively heavy) wide-angle lens without tilting or shifting. Its minimum focus distance is 20 cm. I habitually take close-ups of plants while trying to get their backgrounds in focus too. I would also have taken more architectural photographs in the past if verticals didn't converge so much. 🦥
I doubt 'lot of photographers have a ts lens but never use it'. I've been photographing digitally for 13 years, including buildings and landscapes but I never felt the need to buy it. I might purchase one in the future though although it's use is quite limited
Great tutorial, greatly appreciate it. One thing I realized I really want to know while watching is how to get continuous focus and straight lines in a landscape image at lower f-stops. For instance, one of your lighthouse images at the lens’s sweet spot (around f/5.6), but without the bokeh that would normally occur at that f-stop, and with straight lines. Still learning, so not even sure if that’s possible.
Jeffy, I'm not sure what you're describing is possible. To me, it sounds like what you would want is to focus stack a series of images so that each image captures a different focal plane in focus. I'm not quite sure what you mean by getting straight lines.
Canon makes some good tilt and shift lenses vs Nikon. Especially for architecture and also for panorama work when you prefer to be close to the subject the tilt works very well. I have shot panoramas quite a bit and in order to get a perfect straight line you have to have some distance for the sensor to be in perfect vertical. So the tilt shift does help when you are close to the subject. Thanks for the video.
Canon’s tilt-shift lenses seem to be the go-to for most people, but not the only option on the market. There are a lot of creative uses for tilt-shift lenses I didn’t cover. This 14mm lens is just too wide to demonstrate some of the landscape and portrait uses of tilt-shift. I’ll have another video in a couple weeks reviewing this specific lens and that’s one of the things I’m going to say about it. I’m glad you enjoyed the video.
I use this lens all the time. It produces very sharp images all the time. But, I stop down to f14-18 when I shift. If you are doing this wide open at f4 then, of course, you are going to get poor sharpness in the far reaches.
It really depend on how much you’re using it, and how much you’re willing to spend on your hobby. If it’s something that is going to make you money, then it’s a pretty simple cost/benefit calculation.
