PERFECT PERSPECTIVE
Part 6 of a series!
James Paterson uses powerful Geometry tools to fix converging verticals and wonky photos
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C onverging verticals occur when we angle our camera up towards a building or structure to fit in the frame. The straight vertical edges of the building can lean in towards one another, making it look as if the building is toppling inwards. This effect is emphasized the closer you are to the building – and wider lenses can result in more pronounced distortion. You may be able to avoid converging verticals while taking the shot by stepping back, finding a higher vantage point or using a tilt-shift lens. If these options aren’t possible, some perspective issues can be fixed in Photoshop or Lightroom.
Here we’ve used Camera Raw to fix our photo, but if you’re a Lightroom user, you can use the identical tools in the Develop Module. The Geometry panel offers a host of perspectivecorrecting tools. Several of these apply auto fixes, but there’s also manual control in the form of the Guided Tool. This lets you mark out lines along objects and shapes that you’d like to be either perfectly horizontal or vertical.
TOOL SCHOOL
TOOL SCHOOL HOW TO STRAIGHTEN BUILDINGS
After dragging your guide lines, you may want to fine-tune them to ensure that they match up with the objects in the scene. You can turn on Loupe View in the tool options (or press Shift+L). This gives you a magnified circle so you can see the objects you’re aligning with close-up. There’s also Constrain Crop, which gets rid of transparent areas.
Before getting stuck in with the Guided tool, it’s worth applying lens correction using the Optics panel. Not to be confused with perspective correction in the Geometry panel, lens correction fixes
