HCB Appreciation

OK for focal lens I think we agreed it is somewhere between 40-50mm and probably 50mm for most photographers, what about the aperture closest to human vision?

Or how about our native ISO?

As for our native resolution I remember reading somewhere it is above 100 MP

I think I got some first numbers after searching a bit (they might be wrong)
Focal Lens: 43mm
Aperture: f2.1-f8 (mostly between f2.1-f3.8)
ISO: 1 (!) - 800,000 (mostly during the day between 100-1000)

So HCB better have done some modifications to his Leica

nikos79 said:

(they might be wrong)

Click to expand...

They're meaningless for the most part since human vision is only a small part optics; all of what you see is ultimately heavily post-processed in the visual cortex.

Better figures would be:
Focal length: arbitrary zoom
Aperture: lots
ISO: whateverz

koraks said:

They're meaningless for the most part since human vision is only a small part optics; all of what you see is ultimately heavily post-processed in the visual cortex.

Better figures would be:
Focal length: arbitrary zoom
Aperture: lots
ISO: whateverz

Click to expand...

Sure these estimates were oversimplified and approximated used mostly as a funny analogy
But in an essence there is some science behind them

The idea that a 50mm lens corresponds to human vision is a myth that has become reality only by being endlessly repeated.

In the real world, the eye is a combination of a wide-angle lens and a pretty powerful telephoto lens — a combination impossible to recreate in a camera lens.

If memory serves, there's a passage in one of Barry Thornton's books in which he demonstrates this very convincingly. But just a tiny bit of research on the web will also point to the same facts.

Alex Benjamin said:

The idea that a 50mm lens corresponds to human vision is a myth that has become reality only by being endlessly repeated.

In the real world, the eye is a combination of a wide-angle lens and a pretty powerful telephoto lens — a combination impossible to recreate in a camera lens.

If memory serves, there's a passage in one of Barry Thornton's books in which he demonstrates this very convincingly. But just a tiny bit of research on the web will also point to the same facts.

Click to expand...

Indeed according to ChatGPT:

In practice, your experienced visual field isn’t fixed at any focal length — it behaves like:

• A wide angle for context
• A telephoto for detail
• And an infinite variety in between, depending on attention

No physical camera lens can do that automatically and simultaneously.

One of the biggest differences between photos and sight is that we see in 3D while a photo is 2D. That loss reduces the awe we can experience but can't capture in a photo. Anyone who's photographed Inspiration Point in Yosemite or the Grand Canyon has experienced this.

I can’t help feeling this discussion is over-complicating a simple matter. Human vision is a flexible phenomenon, and the field of view we are conscious of, and our visual acuity, depend on how much we concentrate on a central subject. HCB wasn’t concentrating solely on a central subject, he liked to make compositions within a frame. And as he more or less explained - see quote in post #1208 - he found it easiest to contrive the kind of composition that satisfied him within the field of view of a 50mm, given wider or longer lens options. He found that with a 50, he could exise the elements that interested him from surrounding distractions, and without a feeling of tunnel vision. Some of us find the same. It isn’t necessary to suppose that his vision was different from anyone else’s, or that his head was wired up differently.

Perhaps HCB was more interested in simplicity of image capture, rather than the complexity of camera optical functions.

there is also another thing:
50mm is the more discreet or neutral lens. It doesn’t overwhelm with its form. I have the feeling HCB preferred things simple, no contrast exaggeration or dark room manipulations and the choice of a 50mm supports this philosophy