"Zooming With Your Feet" Is Dumb

I have the same camera and zoom lens you do, Chris. I got the MkII in May 2020 and spent three months only using the 17mm F/1.8 lens and once I felt comfortable with the camera controls I got the 12-40 F/2.8. It's a terrific lens.

Some days I go out with just the 17mm (lighter and more compact) and I'll use my feet to zoom if I need to. If I can't get the shot then so be it. Other times I will put the zoom on and put the 17mm with a polarising filter on the front, in my pocket. It is tiny.

More recently I have picked up some film cameras so I'll maybe have a RF with a 45 or 50mm lens to accompany me. Or I might leave them all at home and just take the Minolta SLR with the 35-80 zoom. It all depends on where and maybe what I plan to shoot that day.

I always use my feet to frame though :)
 
I appreciate your attempt to educate us about perspective. I think the idea of "zooming with one's feet" only theoretically makes sense in areas where zooming is mostly a change of magnification and perspective matters little, like photographing flat scenes and extreme telephoto work with wildlife or sports, although the latter is precisely where changing one's position usually isn't an option.

I do not appreciate that you're presenting your opinion as fact. The preference for using a single focal length or a limited set can be based on many things, not the least of which may be maintaining a certain consistent perspective, so we've come full circle - perspective matters and is different from magnification.
 
Just a quick thought. If zooming with your feet is dumb, then - logically - prime lenses are dumb. Not to mention that you can still zoom with your feet when using a zoom lens (for various reasons, such as insufficient focal range or trying to avoid/embrace the perspective distortion of a given focal length). If I use a 24-70 zoom and do not want the extra-drama of the 24mm focal length, I might very well try to take a few steps back in order to use a "normal" focal length. So, zooming with your feet is fine. And we, as biological beings, zoom a lot with our feet simply because our eyes are prime lenses. Cheers.
 
As someone who does a lot of architectural photography for a living (one of my major clients is the largest homebuilder in the US), I was interested in your post that used photographs of houses as an example. I do a lot of ‘zooming with my feet’ - until they make a perspective control lens that zooms, I don’t have much choice. In your first example, you wanted to eliminate the trees sticking out on the left behind the house, so you moved in closer. As I see it, what you also did was to make that light standard larger and much more prominent - my eyes go right there. So why not just move to the right two feet? That way those trees might have been eliminated, the light standard would have stayed the same size and it likely would have been centred between the two windows and not obscuring one of them. Another option might have been to just retouch those trees out - since they’re on a white sky that would have been a one minute retouch.

Second shot - you wanted to get rid of the trees ‘growing’ out of the top of the house and the garage on the right. I like your solution here but you could have also just moved a few feet to the left and lowered your camera (I know, easier with a PC lens, which not everyone has). That would have gotten rid of both the trees and the garage, though I do admit that you wouldn’t necessarily be dead-center on the house (but it may have brought in part of the shadowed left side of the house which might have given a bit more ‘depth’ to it). Just a thought.

I can definitely see the advantage to using zooms for architectural photography (I’m just using architectural photography as an example, since that’s what you’re using as an example in your photos). Highlighting a detail, feature or creating a little vignette to compress the elements and blur the background can be effective. However I think to categorically state as fact that ‘zooming with your feet is dumb’ and that there is seemingly only one 'right' way to do things is a bit, well....well I won’t say it, but you get the idea. Just my personal opinion mind you.
 
Vince Lupo said:
...make that light standard larger and much more prominent - my eyes go right there. So why not just move to the right two feet? That way those trees might have been eliminated, the light standard would have stayed the same size and it likely would have been centred between the two windows and not obscuring one of them.
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I am glad you mentioned the lighpost; I was bothered by it too but didn't have an ideal solution for it. At least in the second photo, it no longer merges with the raingutter, so there is an improvement there. But the window behind it bothered me.
 
In my early SLR days I just had to have that 80-200mm then "superzoom".
I can only remember ever using it at 200mm. :rolleyes:

For many years after that I used fixed focal length lenses exclusively.
Later I decided to add a few carefully chosen moderate range zoom lenses.
My intent was to be able to more easily tweak framing, especially with slides.

However I find myself still using mostly the fixed focal length lenses.
I guess I just prefer to "zoom with my feet"...

Chris
 
+1 what Chris said.

IMHO zoom lenses are just a (doubtful) convenience, nothing else. I don't think having to approach the subject a bit closer with my feet is inconvenient... unless maybe when an active volcano is being photographed, but even then I'd rather have a good tele prime than even a pro-level zoom. If you think about it zoom's apparent convienience is also slightly overstated as they (especially the good ones) tend to weigh a ton. So yeah, you don't have to "walk to zoom" but instead you just "conveniently" stand there and hold x5 or x10 times the weight of a prime...

Don't get me wrong. There are some good zoom lenses though, like the kit ones. I always liked them despite their very characteristic slightly flat rendering. These indeed are convenient. But still not better optically than a 35mm prime or a nifty fifty.
 
I’m rather agnostic to this debate. First, I understand Chris’s sample images, and their aesthetics, are not what this discussion is about, he offered them as a hypothetical example of how to control the image through camera placement.

I think the issue of primes vs variable telephoto lenses is more to do with cameras offering TTL framing, vs rangefinders with discrete framing options (I.e. frame lines) that therefore require a selection of discrete lenses in those focal lengths. A bag of primes, and having to switch lenses, is just as inconvenient, maybe more, than carrying a heavy zoom already mounted.

My main point is that the title of this thread is a misnomer. The process Chris describes is pre-zooming with one’s feet, to arrive at the desired composition, then selecting a lens focal length to make that composition possible. It’s zooming with your feet, then choosing your lens; not letting the lens do the compositional decision-making by default.
 
MrFujicaman said:
"Zooming" with your feet doesn't work in wildlife photography and could get you killed.
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No no, it's the framing that can get you killed.

So, you first walk to the lion, and after you're kinda happy with the framing, you decide how much of the bushes you feel like including by either selecting a prime or the focal length from your zoom lens.

If you only use one prime, you can skip the whole hassle and be happy with what you get (while getting killed) since this was the decision you made upon leaving home with one lens only.

Seriously speaking, the point of using a prime (and maybe one prime only) is that you get to know the focal length intuitively. Sure, if you mostly shoot houses or façades, you are not in any hurry, and don't really need intuition at all.
 
  • Zoom lens optics are significantly improved due to computer optics design, improved manufacturing processes and on-board lens correction parameters.
  • Zoom lenses are valuable when camera location is restricted due to practical matters.
  • Zoom lenses are valuable in dynamic situations where changing lenses could cause unacceptable delays.
  • Zoom lenses are valuable in environments when dust, blowing sand or water are present.
  • Zoom lenses are heavy and large.They also require large hoods.
  • Zoom lenses have larger front glass elements, more internal elements and higher internal lens-body surface areas. They are more prone to flare and ghosting.
  • Filters for zoom lenses are more expensive because they are larger and wide-angle zoom lenses require ultra-thin filters.
  • Larger zoom lenses can produce shadows with on-camera flash usage.
  • Right now, it is more common to have lens-based stabilization on zoom lenses than on primes. This is irrelvant for platforms with sensor-based stabilization.
  • By employing self-discipline, one can use zoom lens exactly as one uses prime lenses. Just use a set of focal lengths that match commonly used prime lenses.

The last bullet item is relevant to the hypothesis that zooming with your feet is dumb.

It can be limiting to rely on focal length changes to compose a scene rather than changing camera location. When you decide not to move the camera, you decide to abandon using perspective as a creative tool. Some photographic projects benefit from compositions with a constant perspective. When focal length selection is resolute, zoom lenses can achieve this as well as primes. Still, I wonder how often zoom lens, focal-length selection is used for creative effect versus the convenience of not having to zoom with your feet.

It can be limiting to rely on focal length changes to compose a scene rather than changing camera location. When you decide not to move the camera, you decide to abandon using perspective as a creative tool. Not changing camera position could be dumb if indolence prevails.

One could also suggesting a zoom lens is obsolete.The Canon EOS 5DS R has a 50 MP sensor (8712 x 5813 effective pixels). The beloved 19 MP Leica M9 has 5212 x 3472 effective pixels. Using a wide-angel prime with the EOS 5DS R and cropping in post-production. You can crop a Canon 5DS image by a factor of up to ~ 1.7 and still have the same pixel resolution as the M9.

Zoom with your computer.
 
Chris, you sure stirred things up with this one. Maybe we could discuss why film is better than digital next!
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
Years ago, professional photographers switched to using zooms for nearly everything, except for specialized work like macrophotography. Despite that, it is almost universally believed by amateurs on photo forums that using zooms is lazy and that 'real photographer' don't use zooms. They use single focal-length lenses and adjust the composition of their images by "Zooming With Their Feet." That is, they walk closer or further from the subject to adjust the size of the subject in the image.

Of course zooms are not made for many types of cameras (like rangefinders), so instead of a zoom, you would carry a selection of single focal length lenses. A popular idea on RFF is that you should carry only one lens, taking the "Zoom With Your Feet" concept to its most extreme.

The problem with only using one lens and "Zooming With Your Feet" is that the place you stand when you photograph does much more than establish the size of the subject in the image. It affects relationships between the subject and the background and foreground. By carrying only one lens focal length, you're constraining yourself to the point of making many photographs impossible. Here are some examples:




zoom1.jpg


Consider this photograph of my house. There is a large tree in my neighbor's back yard, and it is mostly hidden by my house. I say "Mostly" because some of that tree's branches are visible, sticking out from the side of my house's roof on the left side of the photo. They're ugly and distracting. If I were using a single lens, I'd be stuck with it.






zoom2.jpg


For this photograph, I moved closer to the house, making the tree branches disappear behind the house. To maintain a similar subject size, I set the zoom lens I was using to a shorter (wider angle) focal length.






zoom3.jpg


Here's another example. This is another house in my neighborhood in Fort Wayne. Look at the right side of the image, and you can see a small part of the garage (and the car parked in front of it) sticking out from the side of the house. The garage is not attached to the house, it sits behind and to one side of the house. That little bit of the garage and the car are distracting and ugly. If I had only one single focal-length lens with me, I'd be unable to make a better picture.






zoom4.jpg


As I did in the photograph of my house, I was able to remove the distracting background element by moving closer to the house. Once again, I zoomed out to a shorter, wider-angle, focal-length lens in order to maintain a similar subject size in the image.




These examples were made with a digital camera with a zoom lens (Olympus OM-D E-M1 mark II with the 12-40mm f2.8 Olympus Pro lens), but the conclusions are just as valid with film. You don't even need a zoom lens. When I shoot with my Leicas, I carry 21mm, 28mm, 35mm, 50mm, 90mm, and 135mm lenses so that I can choose the one closest to what is needed to get the composition with the subject/foreground/background relationships I want.

The right way to work is NOT to chose a lens then walk back and forth to get the composition. The right way is to find the place to stand that gives you places the subject and other elements in the image in the right places, then choose the lens (or zoom setting if you use a zoom) that will work to get the composition you want from that camera position!
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Look, there are two kinds of people who zoom with their feet. The first are those who are learning. Of course perspective changes when you move around, and of course it isn't always a good thing. It limits the perspectives you can get for a given shot, even if you take it at the perspective you want, you might have to crop, or even stitch frames. The point is that people who've been weaned on zoom lenses might never think about perspective because they haven't been forced to. The zoom is so versatile that they just shoot from where they stand, framing solely for the subject. A single prime, zooming with your feet, it teaches the reality and the consequences of perspective on composition. It's not the end goal, but it's an important lesson along the way.

The second kind of person who zooms with their feet is one who loves using a prime, knows it very well, and is satisfied missing out on certain opportunities in favor of the opportunities presented by a certain lens. You are obviously not one of these, you're one of the people who feels the need to have nearly every focal length covered at all times - that's proven by the list of prime lenses you have for your RF system. I, on the other hand, love the weight and space reduction offered by a small prime, along with better light-gathering with a larger aperture than a compact zoom would offer, better IQ and more ability to go unseen in street and candid situations. Not to mention the ease of composition that comes with pre-visualization. I give up a lot of shots when I take my GR III with me, but I accept that, because the shots I set out to take are the ones which the 28mm lens gives me. I don't need to catch 'em all, so to speak. I get what I want. Sometimes I see an image I wished I could capture with a longer lens, but, for me, that's all part of the experience. Some shots you don't try to make, you just admire them for what they are and move on.
 
Another time when a zoom is handy - nice random one, this - I have a project where I match up historic postcards with the modern view. If you've ever tried this, you'll now it can be an absolute sod to get right, because if you don't get a reasonable approximation of the focal length used originally, it'll never look right. Some of them turned out to have been taken on glass half-plates because, would you believe, I found the negs on ebay!

At that point a zoom is your saviour - you can adjust until you are happy with ease. However, circa 1910, it was easy for photographers to stand in the road as there was next to no traffic and what there was wasn't going much faster than walking pace. So, like wildlife photography, your framing can get you killed!
 
Bike Tourist said:
...

The prime consideration of photography and the resultant picture is framing.[1] What you frame iis more important than how you framed it.[2]
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[1] THIS +2
A lot of times the point of view is all that matters to make the difference between a great shot and a mediocre or even unusable shot. You see something, evaluate the background and disturbing other things and you choose your point of view to eliminate all the things that screw up you shot. Typically you need to be agile not only with your feet but also with your mind. Just "zooming with your feet" meaning changing the distance between you and the object isn't enough.

[2] The second part I can't really agree to.
If there is something disturbing/distracting in the frame,
it can completely ruin the image, no matter if your main subject is properly in the frame.
Your point of view is always cruical, literally as well as metaphorically.;)
 
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