Tilt shift photography is a popular photography technique that seemingly shows the world in miniature. This effect generally features a very slim plane of focus surrounded by areas of blur.
This technique offers perspective control in a similar way to how macro photography uses a shallow depth of field to draw the viewer’s eye to a portion of the subject. Photographers love the miniature effect of tilt shift photography, so the style is more popular than ever.
Tilt shift lenses: where the technique started
A tilt shift lens is a special kind of camera lens that’s most often used in architectural photography. These lenses are ideal for architecture because they combat the perspective distortion that occurs when photographing large structures.
Each tilt shift lens has two sets of knobs that allow it to tilt in one direction and shift in another to adjust the way the subject appears in the finished image. By adjusting the tilt knob, you can change the focal plane for your image, and either increase or decrease the depth of field. By adjusting the shift knob, you can adjust the image’s perspective.
These lenses are a lot of fun to use, but they can also be an expensive investment. While companies like Lensbaby have introduced more affordable versions of these lenses, many photographers prefer to shoot with their normal lenses and apply this technique in Adobe Photoshop.
If you’d like to practice this editing technique with your Nikon or Canon DSLR or mirrorless camera and aren’t interested in investing in a tilt shift lens, here’s how to get started:
Take some images with tilt shift photography in mind
Not all images work well with that tilt shift miniature effect. The best examples of this type of photography feature a broad field of view taken with a wide angle lens. Try working with lenses with a focal length in the range of 14mm to 40mm to start.
City scenes, beach scenes, aerial shots, and landscapes all work well. The most pronounced miniature effect occurs when the viewer already has a sense of a subject’s scale, so tall buildings, trees, people, and other identifiable objects are all great options to include in your shots.
An aerial perspective helps, but you don’t want to be looking directly down at the scene. If you can photograph the image from a slight elevation, it will help sell the miniature effect. Just make sure that you have sharp focus in your images to begin with. This will really make the selective focus stand out in your post-processing.
Edit your images in Photoshop
Photoshop makes it relatively easy to create great tilt shift images. The process has a bit of a learning curve, but here are the basic steps to get started:
- Open your image in Photoshop.
- Duplicate your background image as a new layer with the keyboard shortcut Ctrl/Cmd+J.
- From the top menu, select Filter > Blur Gallery > Tilt-Shift.
- Once the blur module opens, you’ll see a few parallel lines overlaying your image. The two lines in the center represent the area that will remain in sharp focus.
- Above and below that band of focus, you’ll see feathering lines that indicate the area where focus will have a gradient from in-focus to out of focus. Outside of the feathering lines you’ll see the area of the frame that will be blurred.
- You can drag each of the lines around in the frame until you’re happy with the in-focus portions, the blurred portions, and the feathered portions between them.
- Adjust the blur slider in the right panel. To add more blur, drag the slider to the right. To reduce blur, drag it to the left.
- Once you’re happy with the look of the effect, click OK at the top of the window and Photoshop will render your image.
- Now all you have to do is flatten your image with the keyboard shortcut Shift+Ctrl/Cmd+E and save your new tilt shift photo!
Getting the tilt shift look with your cell phone camera
Many iPhone and Android camera apps offer easy tilt shift functions and selective focus edits for the images you take with your phone. These apps are a great way to get familiar with the technique, and to see if you want to incorporate tilt shift photography into your post-processing workflow.
