He is one of the Covent Garden street performers and from what I heard from his fellow performers, he is from Iran and has been in the UK for years.
He told me it was getting more difficult to connect with audiences because a twenty-five year old doesn’t know who Charlie Chaplin is. In the 1980s and 90s Charlie Chaplin films were on TV, and they knew the character he was playing, but now they think he is Hitler, he said.
Steph the ventriloquist was performing in the Square, extricating herself from a straitjacket while joking with the large crowd. Charlie said how much easier it was for a performer to get a large audience when they talk to the audience. Charlie mimes instructions in character to the volunteers he co-opts into his act.
When I showed him the photos in the viewfinder he said he had to watch his skin because it is dark and he had to keep out of the sun.
Perspective compression or lens compression is a visual effect where distant and close objects appear closer together and more flattened in depth. So what compresses them?
Photograph a person’s face close up and the face will appear big compared to distant objects behind them. Those distant objects will appear small and far away. They may be so small that they are hidden behind the face.
Not only that but the outer parts of the face further from the lens than the nose will appear further away than is ‘natural’. The overall effect is to make the face look narrow and the nose big.
In other words, there is very little or no perspective compression or lens compression because the lens is very near the subject.
Lack of compression is not flattering in people but we don’t mind it is animals because we don’t have a strict idea of what the relative size of nose and ears and the curve of the face should be.
Lens Focal Length
So how, if at all, is perspective compression or lens compression affected by the focal length of a lens?
Long focal lengths create the appearance of compression. That is, subjects in the background appear larger and closer to the foreground, and depth seems flattened. This is not because of the focal length in itself.
It’s because to frame the subject the lens is going to be further away from the subject than a short focal length lens would be.
Short focal lengths create exaggerated perspective, background elements appear smaller and farther away, and depth is exaggerated. This is because the camera has to be nearer to the subject to frame the subject than would be the case with a long focal length lens.
What we get from this is that compression is a function of the distance between the camera and the subject, not directly because of the focal length. But focal length influences how far back you need to stand to frame the subject, which in turn affects compression.
Sensor Size
Sensor size doesn’t directly cause compression, but it affects the field of view for a given focal length. A crop sensor has a narrow field of view than a full-frame sensor used with a lens of the same focal length. Therefore we can use a shorter focal length with a smaller sensor to get the same field of view as a full-frame sensor.
Using Perspective Compression
Perspective compression in use means taking advantage of distance. To make a face look more attractive, shoot from a longer distance, which means using a longer focal length lens.
Typically, a full frame lens with a focal length in the region 135mm to 200mm will flatter a face.
With an APS-C sensor you would get the equivalent compression by using a lens of between 90mm and 135mm.
Cropping
What about cropping the image after you have taken it? For example, a camera with a full-frame equivalent 35mm lens can be cropped to the field of view equivalent of a longer focal length lens.
So what are the limits? The answer is that it the only limit is how many pixels are left. Too few and the image will be poor quality and useless as a photo even if it could be cropped to the equivalence of a longer focal length.
Starting with a 20MP sensor doesn’t leave many pixels left after cropping heavily. But a high megapixel sensor allows more cropping.
For example, the Fujifilm X100VI has a 35mm full-frame equivalent lens and a 40MP sensor, so it will take heavy cropping. Still, a camera that actually has a longer focal length doesn’t need cropping and doesn’t sacrifice any pixels, which is better.
A Practical Example
At some focal length the 17MP micro-four-thirds sensor on the Leica D-Lux 8 that has a zoom range of 24-75mm is going to overtake the pixel count of the cropped image of the 40MP sensor on the 35mm focal length of the Fujifilm X100VI. What is that point?
Short answer: it is at any focal length beyond 53.6mm.
Longer answer: The equivalence of the two sensors is about 1.53:1. Cropping the X100VI to simulate a focal length longer than 53.6mm (full-frame equivalent) results in fewer than 17 megapixels. That of course means that the Leica D-Lux 8 will produce a higher-resolution image beyond this point.
Acuity Is A Function Of Liner Distance
To calculate the megapixel relationship when cropping compares the areas of the sensors. But perceived sharpness or acuity is a function of linear distance, not of area.
Megapixels measure the total number of pixels. which is a measure of area resolution. When cropping, this drops off by the square of the crop factor.
Acuity relates to perceived sharpness or clarity. It is a function of linear resolution, which is the number of pixels per line or per millimetre across width or height that can be perceived.
After all, if you cannot see something as being sharper then for all intents and purposes it is not.
When comparing file sizes or printing then you care about megapixels because it defines the total detail across the image and sets limits on enlargement, cropping, etc.
When comparing sharpness at a specific display size or print size you care about linear resolution or acuity because your eye can only resolve so many lines per inch at a given distance.
While megapixels drop off quadratically, acuity or detail across an image dimension drops linearly with the crop. So we need to do a different calculation.
So looking at the linear distance across the sensor, the X100VI is 7728 pixels wide and the Leica is 4496 pixels wide at its maximum 4:3 aspect.
So the linear relationship is 1.72:1 and that equates to a focal length of 60mm before a photo from the Leica will look sharper, or out-resolves the fuji.
I am looking at X-Trans X series sensors. I am not looking at the Fuji medium format sensors.
Increased acuity reveals more texture and finer detail. It is most noticeable when making large prints, or with heavy cropping.
It is least put to the test in portraits, because the elements are so large in the frame that the eye makes up detail easily. It is most put to the test in subjects with fine detail such as in landscapes.
So what is the difference in perceived sharpness and fine detail rendering between a 40MP sensor (like in the Fuji X-H2 or X-T5 or X-T50) and a 24MP or 26MP sensor (like in the X-T3, X-T4, X-S10, or X-S20)?
Sensor size definitely affects image quality and allows for more cropping. But what about the number of pixels? Is a higher MP (megapixel) count better?
A 24MP X-Trans III sensor is 6,000 x 4,000 pixels. An X-Trans IV sensor is 6240 x 4160 pixels. An X-Trans V sensor is 7728 x 5152 pixels.
Compared to the two smaller megapixel sensors, the X-Trans V sensor has 50% more area. But it is not area that determines extra sharpness. It is linear resolution that determines acuity. In other words, how much longer the longest side is, all other things being equal. And the 40MP sensor translates to approximately 33% more linear resolution.
In photography, acuity refers to the sharpness and clarity of an image, particularly in the details and fine edges. Acutance, a closely related term, describes the edge contrast and the perception of sharpness in an image.
In film photography, some chemical developers increase micro-contrast on edges and give the viewer a perception of increased sharpness. Sharpness tools in applications like Photoshop do a similar thing.
Anyone show has played with the sharpness sliders in Photoshop or Lightroom or any of the other tools knows that is possible to introduce a white halo around edges. If that is done carefully it can increase the apparent contrast between dark and light edges.
Either way, acuity and acutance are related to the ability of the human eye to see and compare the sharpness of different images. After all, if the human eye can’t see the difference in acuity between a lower megapixel image and a higher megapixel sensor then there is no difference in practical terms.
So to repeat, increased acuity is most noticeable when making large prints, or with heavy cropping.
Oh yes, and then there’s the fact that lenses need to be able to resolve that detail. For lenses that can resolve a Fuji 40Mp sensor, see this article: Fuji X-Mount Lens Release Dates: A Complete List.
The headline in one of the newspapers that feature this photo is ‘Covent Garden Celebrates 50 Years of Street Performance Amid Renewed Licensing Concerns’
I was asked to photograph the street performers to publicise the event due to take place on Sunday 11 May to mark 50 years of modern street performance in Covent Garden.
The performers were great to work with and for the photo at the top of this page my only direction was to choose the backdrop and tell them to bunch in from the sides and stay as close as possible from front to back so they would all be in focus.
The photos lower down this page are them getting ready, like any artists do.
The Event Will Take Place On 11th May
The photos I was asked to take are to publicise the event that will take place on Sunday 11th May 2025 with performances from past and present artists, including poet and performer John Hegley, who began his career busking in Covent Garden in the 1980s.
The Square has a proud history and has delighted millions of visitors and launched the careers of household names – names like Eddie Izzard, Dynamo, and Stomp. So the all-day event on 11th May has a pedigree stretching back 50 years. That’s 50 years since public awareness saved Covent Garden from being turned into offices and allowed artists to come in an fill the space.
Renewed Licensing Concerns
And now Covent Garden’s street performances are threatened by Westminster Council’s 2021 licensing scheme, which would make the performances vulnerable to being shut down.
It has already happened on Leicester Square.
After 50 years of successful self regulation the Covent Garden Street Performers Association wants recognition of their proven success in self regulating.
And it’s pretty obvious that the public likes things just as they are.
Look at the photo I took, the photo at the top of this page.
I asked the performers to arrange themselves. But nobody asked the crowd to gather.
The crowd gathered all by itself because the performers are entertaining.
After years and years of street performers entertaining the crowds, the crowds gather, which is proof that people like and them want them – just as they are.
So mark 11th May on your calendar and get down to the Square for what the performers do best.
