PeterWPhoto | Tip: Give your eyes a test.

Tip: Give your eyes a test.

Friday, September 4, 2009 Posted in Tips

Pick up an editorial / whatever magazine you have handy and look at the images. Yes they are most likely horrible just remember somehow this stuff sells. Anyways… Look at the images specifically the portraits. I want you to guess the focal length and aperture. To be honest after looking at so much exif my self I can usually call it. There are things that give it away as far as focal length go.

Look at the lines in the image, the straighter they are the further away they were shot. Most likely the mag will not have anything wider than 50mm probably even 85mm.

Aperture is the one that is more fun. Its quite easy to guess f/2 but it gets quite a bit trickier when you get around f/4 – f/8.

If you know these and can pick out these images it will help you obtain your specific creative visions. If you know you want a certain look it will help you create it.

I hope this was a good warm up for you photographers out there

-Peter

by Peter Walkowiak

3 comments

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September 4, 2009 - 2:18 pm Andrew - most of the time they don't have the focal length or the aperture printed in the magazine. i'd recommend browsing on a site like flickr that lets you check your guesses with the exif data.

September 4, 2009 - 2:48 pm peterwalkowiak - I guess this would be a good point. I was doing this this morning and I was just looking at the different apertures they use for different images. A good idea for sure and all around a good exercise. Thanks for the comment :)

October 22, 2009 - 4:40 pm panda - what kinda portraits are you talking about? like, an USweekly type? or an actual advertisement type portrait? if your talking about the advertisement ones, i can almost guarantee that it was shot near 80 (crop sensor)-105mm(full frame) most pro photographers that can make their shots in magazines use that, it creates the least amount of distortion to their facial and body features