Lens distortion?

[ar14]

Could someone please explain me why the church is not parallel to the trees? It should be because I double checked before taking the shot. Is this because of the barrel distortion of this lens (canon 17-85mm)?
And finally is there a way I can fix this?



Camera: Canon EOS 20D
Lens: Canon 17-85mm IS
Exposure: 0.006 sec (1/160)
Aperture: f/9
Focal Length: 17 mm
ISO Speed: 100
Exposure Bias: 0/2 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire

Thanks for your help!

[rickysu]

on photoshop use distort function and lens correction
just use some correction....

[ar14]

I did that. And it's not good



Now the trees are tilted, unless of course I didn't correct it properly.
Any suggestions?

[sfisher]

It looks like normal perspective to me. I have the 17-85 and there is a lot of barrel distortion at 17mm, but not that much!

You're below the treetops and the church looking upwards at them, so I would expect them to point towards each other, like railway tracks converging into the distance.

[krypticide]

You could check lens reviews and see how much barrel distortion there is, and dial it in. You probably over-did it in your fixed shot, since like sfisher says, the church and trees should lean toward each other slightly due to your perspective.

[jsanders]

Hmm Somethig still doesn't look right. Maybe you should just take the photo again...

[Taallyn]

I think it might be perspective distortion from your camera angle. When you point the camera up like that, the perspective can start to go wonky on you (that's a technical term btw ). Hold the camera parallel to the ground next time to see if it helps at all.

[glyphon]

Originally Posted by ar14

I did that. And it's not good
...
Now the trees are tilted, unless of course I didn't correct it properly.
Any suggestions?

you just over did vertical perspective adjustment, and didn't use the angle adjustment.

hope you don't mind, but i tried it, and after some cropping, it turned out pretty good.

settings i used where...
• vertical perspective: -36
• angle: 355
...and then i cropped to the inside lines from the transform.

[chins]

17-85mm is well known for its barrel distortions at wide agle and pincussion distortions.
I would try PTLens http://epaperpress.com/ptlens/ instead of photoshop to fix it. Its only 15$ software.

[ar14]

you just over did vertical perspective adjustment, and didn't use the angle adjustment

Thanks glyphon.
I knew there had to be something i wasn't doing right.
Thanks again.