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Q. How to level the Horizon
Asked by Chris Hunter
(K=25634) on 7/21/2006
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Understanding how to Level the Horizon
Many times after taking landscape images or photos which feature the horizon prominently, you will notice that the horizon appears crooked in relation to the edges of the photo.
This may be a serious problem if you wish to produce gallery-quality prints to be mounted and framed, as the horizon line will be clearly crooked in relation to the matte and frame.
When shooting in the field, it is always important to try to level the horizon when taking the photo. There are several reasons for this. First, with digital images, if you have to severely rotate the canvas - then you will lose valuable resolution. Second, it takes time to rotate every image after a long day of shooting dozens or hundreds of photos.
If you’re using a tripod, you can adjust each individual leg of the tripod until the horizon is as close to straight as possible. Giving the horizon a quick check when composing your frame will save you time and resolution later.
When opening your document in Photoshop, first look at the horizon in relation to the other elements in the photo. Does having an absolutely straight horizon matter for this image? And how crooked is the horizon? If it is severely crooked, you will lose a considerable amount of the image around the four edges after straightening it.
As a general rule, landscape, sports, nautical and other photos shot in a classical manner will feature absolutely straight horizons. This is one of the important points of this type of photography, however many will disagree, especially when more abstract images are considered. As far this article, it is assumed that the photographer intends to have a perfectly straight horizon.
To straighten the image in Photoshop, begin by going to Window>Show Tools. Now click and hold on the eyedropper tool (right above the zoom tool in the bottom left of the palette) until a sub menu appears which will show a small ruler icon, called the ‘Measure Tool.’
The measure tool is how we will tell Photoshop the exact measurement in degrees that the image needs to be rotated in order to have a straight horizon.
With the measure tool selected, begin drawing at the far right hand side of the horizon. It is important to be sure you are as close to the horizon line as possible. Drag until you reach the most visible portion of the horizon to the left.
Once you have gone from one side of the horizon to the other, check and make sure you have drawn a line that matches the tilt of the horizon as close as possible.
It is important to select a background color that will provide sufficient contrast with your image. After you rotate the image, there will be space around the four corners of the image which will need to be cropped out.
Whatever color is selected as the background color (Photoshop CS and older), will be the color that appears behind your image after rotation. If you have a dark photo, select white as the background color; for a brighter photo, select gray or black.
Next, go to image>Rotate Canvas>Arbitrary.
The tilt of the measurement tool will automatically appear in degrees in the Rotate Arbitrary dialogue box.
Hit OK, and the canvas will be rotated.
Now, select the crop tool (c) and drag from the bottom left corner to the top right corner of your image. After selecting the entire portion of the canvas, drag each side in by grabbing and moving the small boxes in the middle of each side.
Drag the crop box in until the empty space left over from the rotation is grayed out.
Now hit enter and the crop command will be done, leaving you with a photo with a straight horizon and no empty space on the sides of your image.
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Kambiz K
(K=37420) - Comment Date 7/31/2006
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Chris, why you do not open a section under 'Lesson' and write your helpful ponts.
When I saw your title in the help forum, I surprised to see your name with asking help?
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Stan Pustylnik
(K=6768) - Comment Date 7/31/2006
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Joking aside, straight horizon near ocean is incredibly difficult for me personally. My DSLR doesn't have grid. I always try have perfectly straight horizon and using heavy tripod with manfrotto ball head, but still most of times I get 1-2 degrees tilt, invisible to my eye during composition.
It's hard with telephoto, it's near impossible to get perfectly straight horizon line with 17mm wide angle. With wide angle it becomes nightmare actually....
I try avoiding post processing my images by all means, but with ocean shots it's not possible.
Same problem when shooting landscapes during low light conditions when eye can't detect horizon perfectly. Then I do first 1-3 shots only to straighten horizon line.
Chris, sounds easy, but not at all... :)
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Supporting Team
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Chris Hunter
(K=25634) - Comment Date 7/31/2006
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Hi Stan, this image is showing a .38 degree tilt to the horizon, which to me is perfectly acceptable, losing only a very minimal amount of the photos edges after straighten and crop.
I hear what you mean with leveling it durning low light or esp. on ricks shoreline conditions. The easiest way that I've found is to adjust each tripod leg independently until the horizon is straight.
Cheers,
Chris
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Stan Pustylnik
(K=6768) - Comment Date 7/31/2006
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:) it maybe just 0.38 tilt but it's still visible in image. It's not visible in viewfinder. Your advice with tripod legs will not work, because of this. Tilt will be obvious only on printed photo, or computer screen, which makes me frustrated. I really wish to have grid in viewfinder.
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Chris Hunter
(K=25634) - Comment Date 7/31/2006
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Yes, and while still visible it is quite an easy fix in PS.
You would lose approx. 1/32" on each side after the above described fix.... which would be minimal impace to either composition or resolution.
However, I understand your frustration in not being able to get the horizon perfectly straight in camera... but to me being within 1 degree of perfectly straight is acceptable.
Cheers,
Chris
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Scott McFadden
(K=5663) - Comment Date 8/24/2006
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Nice article well written and author deserves A HUGE thanx.
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