Sports Photo Tip of the Month Dutch Tilts and Angles
you want to convey a real sense of dyI fnamic action in your sports photos, try tilt-
ing your camera so that your subject cuts across the frame of the photo on a diagonal angle. Diagonal angles are widely used in photography, videography and graphic design to convey a sense of action or motion in an otherwise static, still picture. The Dutch Tilt is a compositional technique used in photography to create the feeling of unease, danger, anxiety, or disorientation. It consists of an intentionally angled composition where the normal perspective is rotated, skewing the normal vertical and horizontal planes of the image. Also known as the Dutch Angle or Canted Angle, the technique derives from a cinematography technique first used in post-World War I Germany.
(C) Warren Rosenberg, nyspg.com
In fact, many believe the word Dutch is actually a corruption of Deutch and purists may call the technique the Deutch Tilt or German Tilt. The DutchTilt is frequently used in advertising and sports action photography to convey a sense of edginess. Try doing a web search on the words “photos using dutch tilt” and you’ll find lots of examples. Better yet, simply look at the logos created for Major League Baseball, the Indycar Race League or the NBA and you’ll see that those graphic designers used a version of the Dutch Tilt to convey a sense of action and motion in their images.
(C) Warren Rosenberg, nyspg.com
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