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Perspective 101

© Copyright 2001, Jim Loy

On the left is a typical drawing showing perspective. The idea is that many lines (not all lines) appear to converge at the vanishing point on the horizon. This is a vast improvement, in adding realism, over children's drawings without perspective. Actually, only parallel horizontal lines seem to meet at the same point on the horizon. In this picture, if the railroad tracks were not parallel to some of the lines on the building, then they would meet at a different point on the horizon. Other horizontal parallel lines, the railroad ties, and two lines on the building, have been drawn parallel and horizontally. Rotate the picture slightly (picture on the right), and these horizontal lines should appear to meet at another point on the horizon. The two slanting lines of the roof should also meet way up in the sky somewhere. Those were also drawn parallel to each other, which was good enough.

A mistake: Here is a simplified version of an example of perspective that is found in a couple of books. It is all fairly good except for the two green objects. Those are supposed to be rectangular solids with one end on the flat ground, and the other end up in the air. If that is so, then their vanishing points should not be on the horizon, but above the horizon somewhere. It looks very amusing to me. It makes the artist look like an idiot.

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