Thijs Lucas
One of the reasons to buy the 200mm lens was to play with the compression between foreground and background. So far I shoot with lenses of 16, 23 and 50 mm and the compression between the 16 and the 50 is already clear. But I wanted more. So I bought the 200 mm Pentax-M SMC 200 #PentaxM200f4SMC (https://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/SMC-Pentax-M-200mm-F4-Lens.html) on Kleinanzeigen for 50€ to play with.

First thing I recognised was, how far I have to walk bag to get enough distance between me an other people and that this will be quite challenging. But now seeing the pictures I enjoy the compression.

I will share my thoughht with three pictures.

| 1/250 | f? | 200mm | ISO500 |
The picture of the fisherman has the Laboe Naval Memorial in the background. Not sharp, but with the information that it is there. The compression helps to reduce the amount of information and chaos coming into the picture. So the compression helps to get clearer more focused information in the background while reducing it.

#Kiel #Kiellinie #CompressionEffect
#Fujifilm #FujifilmXT3 #PentaxM200f4SMC
Feb 24 at 3:43pmWeb
Show threadThijs LucasFeb 24
On one hand, yes. This article (German) has some good visualisations of the technical concept in terms of geometry: https://www.cizucu.com/de/magazines/2024-08-compression-effect

If one would crop to the center one would have a very similar picture. For me the difference woud be the limitations a tool as a 200mm lense would offer is something I am looking for. If I would use my 50mm to do that I would lose 3 quarter of the sensor and would have three times as much picture in the view finder than with the 200mm. So using the 200mm for me is a very handy simplification.
Die Faszination und Anwendung des Kompressionseffekts in der Fotografie | Knowledge #81 | Magazin | cizucu

Der Kompressionseffekt ist ein Phänomen, bei dem entfernte Landschaften näher erscheinen und das Motiv und der Hintergrund näher zusammenrücken. Durch die Nutzung dieses Effekts kann man Fotos mehr Dramatik und Tiefe verleihen. In diesem Artikel erklären wir die Grundlagen des Kompressionseffekts und seine Anwendungsmöglichkeiten und geben kreative Fotografie-Tipps.

cizucu
Show threadRalf StubnerFeb 24
Thanks for sharing! I think you have found an important concept: It is not the lens that changes the perspective (like the compression effect) but your position relative to subject and background (or foreground). If you had taken an image from the same location with your 50mm lens and then zoomed in heavily you would have gotten a very similar image, just with lower resolution.