“Mountain photography” (4)

Hints on the art and technique from a practitioner of the nineteen-forties.

Linear perspective: Mountains, even the minor hills of the PENNINE, are so big and usually so distant that impressions of scale and recession can only be assessed by other things, which are associated with distance and size. When there is obvious linear perspective in a scene the lines of a road converging to the horizon, or a similar line along the roofs of houses- we have no difficulty in perceiving distance. Even when the line is not obvious, we easily and subconsciously assess distance from the reduction in apparent size of well-known objects, such as houses, trees and men.

Unidentified waterfall and figure by Christof Croeber.

Illustration from Mountain Photography by C Douglas Milner.

In open mountain country obvious linear perspective is rare. It is occasionally seen in a mild form when rock faces are built in pronounced horizontal strata, as are the towers of the DOLOMITES. The occurrence of well-known objects is more frequent, and can usefully be employed in a photograph to give scale. The placing of a solitary figure in the foreground, however, usually large in relation to the picture space, does not give scale, but rather serves, by accentuating the small area of the distant mountain, to squash it.

Figures are most satisfactorily employed to give scale to the plane in which they are seen. With lenses of normal angle of view, however, the useful limit within which figures can be introduced to serve this purpose of giving scale, is easily reached. At 240 yards a man's figure would occupy only half a degree of arc, in a photograph covering perhaps 40 or 50 degrees, and thus would be so insignificant a part of the picture that he would be in danger of being overlooked, even if his outline were clearly recorded by the lens. 

On the other hand, figures tend to draw too much attention to themselves and so, quite apart from matters of perspective, should not be allowed too near the camera, if their purpose is subsidiary. Between 40 and 100 ft. are useful distances within which a figure or a small group can help to give an idea of the vastness of a view.

References

From C Douglas Milner, Mountain Photography: Its Art and Technique in Britain and Abroad, The Focal Press, First printed October 1945, reprinted June 1946.