This week, I will be going over the use of camera angles. Unlike something like exposure, camera angles are much easier to understand, but also have a large impact on how your photo is perceived. Camera angle uses the internalized social dynamics everyone has to influence how a subject or scene is perceived. Eg. Looking up to someone, and looking down on someone, and seeing somebody eye to eye mean very different things, and those ideas can be adapted to photography for artistic use.
Low Angle
Low angles shots are taken when the camera is physically below the subject and looking up at it. This can be done to any degree, depending on how subtle you want to make it. Camera angles looking from far on the ground, looking up can make it seem like your are seeing the world from the eyes of a child, while more subtle effects can convey a power dynamic. In the 1991 movie Silence of the Lambs, the initial scene where Clarise meets Hannibal uses very subtle differences of viewpoints to convey the back and forth between the two characters, gradually giving Hannibal more and more significance as their conversation slowly begins to get to Clarise.
To watch that scene, click here.
To emphasize the authority of the officer, I took this picture from hip height, looking slightly up at him.
Eye Level
Shots taken from eye level are neutral. They neither convey a sense of power nor helplessness and should be used to show a sense of equality or neutrality. Shots taken from eye level have much less power than the other angles, because they are how we normally perceive the world. From eye level, nothing seems out of place or interesting. That being said, not every photo needs a psychological power dynamic, and photos taken from eye level have as much potential as those taken from different angles.
In this photo, instead of focusing on any social dynamics, I chose instead to focus on the subject. In the same vein, only the subject is in focus in the picture, further emphasizing my focus on her.
High Angle
High angle shots, obviously, are the opposite of low angle shots. The camera is physically above its subject and looking down. When used subtly, high angles give the viewer a sense of power of the subject. Extreme high angles give viewers a bird's eye view of a scene or subject, and can be used to convey distance, rather that power, over a subject.
To convey the powerlessness of the fish, I took the photo so that the viewer was looking down at it. If I had taken the same picture from below, or level with it, the picture would look okay, but there would be some sense that something is off with it.
In New York, you tend to get a lot of opportunity to take photos from above. Because of how sharply the camera is angled down, it almost feels like the viewer is a bird, flying overhead. Because of this, viewers feel much more detached and less intimate with the subject.
