# Why aren't pictures round?



## hamlet (Aug 13, 2014)

I'm wondering why we use round lenses to record an image onto a rectangular surface? I mean isn't that just a huge waste of resources and needless weight added onto the lens? Why not have rectangular lenses? What do you think about this?


----------



## D-B-J (Aug 13, 2014)

This was hashed out in an older thread.  Things like simplicity of making them is one reason, I think.


----------



## unpopular (Aug 13, 2014)

Yeah, I agree. It probably has to do with cutting paper and not wanting to see a vignette as our eyes do not vignette under normal circumstances.


----------



## Light Guru (Aug 13, 2014)

hamlet said:


> I'm wondering why we use round lenses to record an image onto a rectangular surface? I mean isn't that just a huge waste of resources and needless weight added onto the lens? Why not have rectangular lenses? What do you think about this?



Because designing and building rectangular lenses is would be more expensive then designing and building round lenses.


----------



## slackercruster (Aug 13, 2014)

OP, I do a lot with round pix. At least I started a few months ago. I like em.


----------



## Ysarex (Aug 13, 2014)

Of course, because frames aren't round.

Joe


----------



## snowbear (Aug 13, 2014)

Since the sensors and film are smaller than the actual image projected onto them by the lens, I'd say resources used (plastic, emulsion, silicon, etc.) are less.  Of course if you use a DX lens on 35mm or larger format film, then you're wasting resources.


----------



## hamlet (Aug 13, 2014)

unpopular said:


> Yeah, I agree. It probably has to do with cutting paper and not wanting to see a vignette as our eyes do not vignette under normal circumstances.



See we don't really know that because each human brain is equipped with an internal lightroom. There's actually like a huge blindspot in your eyes.


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 13, 2014)

Because film was expensive until 1990 and wasting half of the area of the film is a waste while light is free.

If you look at old daguerreotypes, images were typically round due to the extreme vignetting created by the far less sensitive silver compounds placed on metal that were traditionally used in the 1800's


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 13, 2014)

The world ran out of round film.


----------



## unpopular (Aug 13, 2014)

Even if the lens was square, would the image be also? I don't really think this is the case is it?


----------



## 480sparky (Aug 13, 2014)

Film and paper are sheet goods.  It's much more economical to make squares and rectangles out of them than it is to make a bunch of circles and waste the material between the circles.  When digital came along, we were using rectangular screens to view them with, so they naturally retained the four-cornered image.

This, and photography fell in line right behind painting.... which usually used a square or rectangular canvas.


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 13, 2014)

the shape of the lens does not matter.
What matters is how all the internal lenses were designed to transmit and project the image at the inside end.
but I would think designing a square lens would require larger round lenses, which then had to be cut down to a rectangular shape.
Thus adding more steps and costs to the process.

Plus, think of how your zoom and focus.  This would change the shape of a rectangular lens to square, which would add more material and weight.  But to optimally make the entire lens functionally better the lens would have to be even larger, with more weight to the glass.
And you'd probably end up with a round set of lens elements sooner or later just from design and manufacturing efficiencies.


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 13, 2014)

Plus, as an aperture almost always (unless very small) needs to be round to produce an image the only function the square lens would play would be cropping a projected image that would naturally be round in the first place.

^correct me if I'm wrong. Its been 4 years since I've studied this stuff.


----------



## CAP (Aug 13, 2014)

Rectangle lenses would provide lens barrels that would be difficult to focus. Imagine turning a rectangle, focusing ring not, to mention attaching rectangle filters.
Finding picture frames would become interesting, now we&#8217;d have different circumference size frames.
There would be tons of paper waste because paper is in a rectangular format, so round prints would create a non-green environment.
Round computer monitors to view photos doesn&#8217;t make sense.
It becomes difficult to properly align round images in frames and hang them properly, exactly the way they were captured.
If video adopted round formats, tubeless televisions today but appear as one large tube.
Our smart phones would become round to view the images properly too. Now can you imagine round Instagram photos instead of their current square format? Even worse, if you dropped your phone can you picture it rolling down hill?
Billboards would become round adding a tunnel vision perception.
If theater screens were round would we be sitting in tunnels viewing movies instead of rectangular theater rooms? Can you imagine the acoustics alone?
The Rule of Thirds would require a revision.


----------



## KmH (Aug 13, 2014)

hamlet said:


> [h=2]Why aren't pictures round?[/h]


Because not all pictures are made with a camera and lens.

Photography is the new kid on the block (first practical in 1839). In fact really new, having been around for less than 200 years, so far.
History of photography - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


----------



## hamlet (Aug 14, 2014)

So if a rectangular lens is hard to create then the sensor could become round to capture all of the light that is going to it. Whether you would keep it round in post or not would just become a creative decision.


----------



## pgriz (Aug 14, 2014)

Figuring out the optical path of a round lens is much simpler than figuring out the path of light in a rectangular lens.  Using a helical or screw mechanism to vary the spacing between optical elements (in a zoom) is straightforward with a round frame, but much more complicated in a rectangular frame.  So the default in lenses is round.

Sensors whether they be film or silicon, are rectangular to maximize yield.  Display media is rectangular for the same reasons.

Frames are much easier to build in rectangular fashion compared to round.


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 14, 2014)

Photos are Round.
They just have edges to them that you have to cut off to finish them.


----------



## baturn (Aug 14, 2014)

What he said^. Scissors are your friend.


----------



## pgriz (Aug 14, 2014)

baturn said:


> What he said^. Scissors are your friend.



No, that marks you as an amateur.  "Real" professionals do the slicing and dicing with ninja swords made with Damascus steel.  And the 'top" pros use the quantum uncertainity gullotines to make inconvenient parts disappear.  :mrgreen:


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 14, 2014)

pgriz said:


> baturn said:
> 
> 
> > What he said^. Scissors are your friend.
> ...


Are you saying the Pros chop up the subjects before taking pictures with their pro round film ?

kinda makes it really important to get the shot right the FIRST time ...


----------



## julianliu (Aug 14, 2014)

Ysarex said:


> Of course, because frames aren't round.  Joe



I agree. It make sense to make rectangular film negatives then round ones in the old days


----------



## unpopular (Aug 14, 2014)

astroNikon said:


> the shape of the lens does not matter.
> What matters is how all the internal lenses were designed to transmit and project the image at the inside end.
> but I would think designing a square lens would require larger round lenses, which then had to be cut down to a rectangular shape.
> Thus adding more steps and costs to the process.
> ...



I am still having a really hard time imagining the physics of a lens that produces a square or rectangular image. As you point out, making square lenses isn't a problem, you just trim the edges, but that certainly wouldn't change the shape of the image circle, at least not inherently, but rather just sort of crop the edges since the exit would be square. Though, this wouldn't be anything more special than just masking the rear element of a traditional lens.

I'd think a lens that projects a square image inherently would need square circles of confusion, but even doing just this alone doesn't change the image circle, otherwise image circles would be polygonal as it is.

Where did Helen go?


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

unpopular said:


> I'd think a lens that projects a square image inherently would need square circles of confusion,


I like that.
Impossible, even nature doesn't know, how to square the circle.  Isn't it (round image) because circle is created by expanding a point and this may happen only at constant rate in every direction (on one plane, in 3D this creates a sphere).


----------



## hamlet (Aug 15, 2014)

So square peg goes into the round hole? Or is it the other way around?


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 15, 2014)

Just put a Fisheye lens on your camera then you'll have your round image.


----------



## hamlet (Aug 15, 2014)

It's not really about the preferred shape of the final image, i was just wondering why we waste so much glass when taking an image on a rectangular sensor. It can't be helped out of necessity really, as a lot of folks have explained it. I personally am actually curious why we use straight lines to portray reality in? Straight lines seem so out of character when viewed from an outside perspective. It is just looks like a tradition we've been handed down from people who no longer have a stake in this world. The familiarity of straight objects is so familiar and yet so foreign. That is the best way i can describe how i feel about that subject. Sorry for the long tirade.


----------



## pgriz (Aug 15, 2014)

Straight lines are there because they are usually the shortest distance between any two points, and therefore the simplest solution.  Anything else is a curve, and curves are more complicated, both to make, and to follow.  While there are definitely curves I love to follow, we'll not get into that here.


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> It's not really about the preferred shape of the final image, i was just wondering why we waste so much glass when taking an image on a rectangular sensor. It can't be helped out of necessity really, as a lot of folks have explained it. I personally am actually curious why we use straight lines to portray reality in?


To make square lenses first one has to make the round. Technologically it is cheaper and anyway, suckers like photographers will pay for it.  If you worry about lost material think why in North America electricity is 110V and not like in Europe 220V. There was ONE reason only, which is greed.
Why we use straight lines ? Light travels in straight lines so is only natural for our perception. What do you mean by "outside" perspective ? There is only one perspective, your point of view perspective, you change your point of view, you change your perspective. Only cubism can reconcile many perspectives. Try to compose your pictures like this guy (which is not bad idea, I like it ):
3 days in Havana


----------



## EIngerson (Aug 15, 2014)

Because the world would suck without corners.


----------



## runnah (Aug 15, 2014)

This conversation is beyond dumb.


----------



## hamlet (Aug 15, 2014)

timor said:


> hamlet said:
> 
> 
> > It's not really about the preferred shape of the final image, i was just wondering why we waste so much glass when taking an image on a rectangular sensor. It can't be helped out of necessity really, as a lot of folks have explained it. I personally am actually curious why we use straight lines to portray reality in?
> ...



What i mean by an "outsiders perception" is of course: not like my casual point of view. I'm of course not so arrogant to presumre to speak for anyone but myself.


----------



## unpopular (Aug 15, 2014)

there is, this, otoh....

360° optics for machine-vision inspection challenges | Opto Engineering*

you know, in case you need to photograph the sides and top of something simultaneously from above.


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> What i mean by an "outsiders perception" is of course: not like my casual point of view. I'm of course not so arrogant to presumre to speak for anyone but myself.


That's the good thing about us. That's why photography other, than portraits, is so interesting. If you photograph a perspective from your point of view, now I can see, what you see. (Or at least have a fighting chance to do so.) I am the outsider perception (and everybody else on this planet off course). But if you can experience  outsider perception at the same time, when evaluating own, that will put you on higher level, than I can be. Some people have that, then the planes of understanding change and I can only chase the ideas. Which is fun to.


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

unpopular said:


> there is, this, otoh....
> 
> 360° optics for machine-vision inspection challenges | Opto Engineering*
> 
> you know, in case you need to photograph the sides and top of something simultaneously from above.


So I was wrong, light doesn't travel in straight lines. 
Luckily that's only mirrors and CAD combining multiple images.


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 15, 2014)

Well if you want to go down to a quantum level it doesn't. It travels in waves. And if you want to look at it on an astronomical level it bends around large gravitation sources like galaxies


----------



## hamlet (Aug 15, 2014)

You should check out this little video, it is informative:


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 15, 2014)

EIngerson said:


> Because the world would suck without corners.


The world is a cube?


----------



## unpopular (Aug 15, 2014)

W.Y.Photo said:


> Well if you want to go down to a quantum level it doesn't. It travels in waves. And if you want to look at it on an astronomical level it bends around large gravitation sources like galaxies



Nevermind Timor and his obnoxious Newtonian tendencies!


----------



## unpopular (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> You should check out this little video, it is informative:



Yeah, I've seen this. It's unholy witchcraft if you ask me.


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> You should check out this little video, it is informative:


Thanks, I've seen it some time ago. My son watches TED a lot.  The most interesting thing is how they created this camera, not as much what it can do. And then, without a black hole somewhere close by light still doesn't want to bend.


----------



## timor (Aug 15, 2014)

unpopular said:


> Yeah, I've seen this. It's unholy witchcraft if you ask me.


And I can see the customers for it.


----------



## hamlet (Aug 15, 2014)

astroNikon said:


> EIngerson said:
> 
> 
> > Because the world would suck without corners.
> ...



And that's the last we heard of elngerson, because he went out too far to the sea and fell off of the edge of the world.


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> astroNikon said:
> 
> 
> > EIngerson said:
> ...


I heard there are them Monsters out near the edge of the world.


----------



## 480sparky (Aug 15, 2014)

We would have to "think outside the ellipse.



W.Y.Photo said:


> .... And if you want to look at it on an astronomical level it bends around large gravitation sources like galaxies




Well, technically,  it bends due to ALL gravitational sources.  Not just large ones. Light being affected by the Sun's gravity was observed decades ago.


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> You should check out this little video, it is informative:



So the real question is, when is Nikon going to introduce a camera with a Frames Per Second of a trillion frames per second in an affordable hand held camera sold at BestBuy for anyone to buy.


----------



## pgriz (Aug 15, 2014)

Sure, why not.  But it's going to be an editing nightmare. :mrgreen:


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 15, 2014)

I'm not complaining. I'll talk about light all day!


----------



## Derrel (Aug 15, 2014)

round Kodak pictures - Google Search


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 15, 2014)

Derrel said:


> round Kodak pictures - Google Search


The biggest problem with those cameras is that they came with Round lenses.  They should have been equipped with square lens.

After all the square lens was how they make the ViewMaster slides :mrgreen:


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 15, 2014)

hamlet said:


> You should check out this little video, it is informative:



This is like... the coolest thing I've ever seen. Just so you know.


----------



## unpopular (Aug 15, 2014)

astroNikon said:


> hamlet said:
> 
> 
> > You should check out this little video, it is informative:
> ...


----------



## manaheim (Aug 15, 2014)

Oh look. A hamlet thread that makes me want to kill myself. Shocking.


----------



## runnah (Aug 15, 2014)

manaheim said:


> Oh look. A hamlet thread that makes me want to kill myself. Shocking.



Well I was going to make a "why are wheels round" thread but  I didn't want to steal his thunder.


----------



## pgriz (Aug 15, 2014)

Ah you two are unthinking philistines D ).

Questioning known "truths" gave us newtonian physics, copernican astronomy, ensteinian physics, darwinian biology, and a bunch more things.  Of course, there's also a line separating genius and lunacy, which often isn't obvious until much later.  So there should be, at least in my opinion, some tolerance for asking of "stupid" questions.  In the hands of the right questioner, it turns a "stupid question" into a beacon of new discovery.  And we do need those.


----------



## unpopular (Aug 15, 2014)

pgriz said:


> Ah you two are unthinking philistines D ).



A little bit racist, don't you think!


----------



## manaheim (Aug 15, 2014)

Darwin... Einstein... Newton....

...hamlet.


----------



## vintagesnaps (Aug 15, 2014)

For practical purposes, I think for a focusing ring to turn smoothly you'd need a rounded lens.

It might conceivably be possible to have round frames on roll film but I don't know that it would work too well - you'd have to somehow have individual round frames attached in a way to advance thru a camera (and a camera that could advance it). And even once there 'non curling' film was manufactured it still has some curl to it so it would probably keep catching on sprockets when you'd try to advance it. So for it to be in a roll it's made in strips, and a strip of rectangular frames is what works.

I suppose it could be possible to make a round sensor but probably not practical to have round pictures. Media seems to use square or rectangular formats, we read left to right and top to bottom and being able to store books on a shelf makes round impractical for print media. (I mean, there are kiddie books that are round or different shapes but I don't know if otherwise round would be practical). Even digitally for text and photos to fit into a readable format round probably would be harder to view and read rows of text.


----------



## bogeyguy (Aug 15, 2014)

Why is there air??


----------



## pgriz (Aug 15, 2014)

unpopular said:


> pgriz said:
> 
> 
> > Ah you two are unthinking philistines D ).
> ...



Well, I'm not sure philistines are a "race" per se.  Tribe, maybe.  :mrgreen:


----------



## mishele (Aug 15, 2014)

Because I don't like circles. ;O


----------



## W.Y.Photo (Aug 16, 2014)

bogeyguy said:


> Why is there air??



The gas particles in the early universe that the gravity and magnetic field of earth were capable of holding in became earths atmoshpere.

Duh. ldman:


----------



## EIngerson (Aug 16, 2014)

astroNikon said:


> EIngerson said:
> 
> 
> > Because the world would suck without corners.
> ...



No, but think of how expensive frames would be if they had to be round.


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 16, 2014)

vintagesnaps said:


> You want a round picture? here you go. Although technically it's still rectangular... or round with a lotta vignette. This was done playing around with my digital camera when I first got it, the Ricoh GXR with the original unit that made it into a nothing special p&s. Once they finally came out with the unit that takes Leica mount lenses there was no going back to this. And why I was playing with zooming the lens all the way I can't possibly remember or explain, but this was the crappy jpeg straight out of the camera.
> 
> View attachment 82147
> 
> ...




But I cut a circle in a piece of paper and put it in front of my camera lens and the photo still came out rectangular ???  :lmao:

It must be witchcraft ...


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 16, 2014)

manaheim said:


> Darwin... Einstein... Newton....
> 
> ...hamlet.


Darwin Barney
Einstein Bagels
Fig Newtons

and the Tragedy of Hamlet


----------



## astroNikon (Aug 16, 2014)

manaheim said:


> Oh look. A hamlet thread that makes me want to kill myself. Shocking.



We kept this thread open and flowing just for you


----------



## BuS_RiDeR (Aug 16, 2014)

Film = Square/Rectangle
Sensor = Square/Rectangle

The lens shape is irrelevant.... As long as the light gets in to expose the film/sensor...


----------

