The different types of perspective

The different types of perspective

A reference image (whether drawing or photo) could be characterised with one of three different perspective types. The key difference between the three types is the number of ‘vanishing points’ – an actual point, or points, in the scene towards which all lines converge.

Let’s now take a look at each type in turn :

One-point perspective

An image with ‘one-point’ perspective will contain only one of these ‘vanishing points’, and as such there will be only 3 ways that lines in the scene can be shown – 1) running vertically, 2) running horizontally, or 3) at an angle, converging towards the ‘vanishing point’.

Take a look at the example images below. In the top one, you can see that the camera has been placed so that it looks directly down the street. The fronts of the buildings are exactly perpendicular to this direction, and therefore present us with only vertical or horizontal lines. The tops and bottoms of the buildings (and the other lines in between) however, are all at an angle. If you were to take a pencil and ruler and extend these lines further into the scene, you would see that they all come together and cross at a single point, and that (as you’ve probably guessed), is our vanishing point.

The photograph below it shows the same effect, this time looking down a train track.

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Two-point perspective

As you have probably inferred from the name, two point perspective has double the amount of vanishing points. If you take a look at the examples below, you can see that the camera is no longer positioned so that it’s looking directly towards a particular vanishing point, and as a result the horizontal lines from the previous perspective type are now running at an angle – something that introduces our second vanishing point. If you were to extend all of these angled lines as before, you’d see that they now eventually meet on either the left or right side of the image. Vertical lines are still vertical however!

One other thing to take into account are ‘horizon’ lines, the imaginary line at the same height as, and running perpendicular to the camera. This can quickly be created by drawing a straight line between our 2 vanishing point, and is used to get an estimate for the height of the camera.

The photo shown gives a typical, everyday example of two point perspective – the corner of a building.

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Three point perspective

This perspective type takes things to their natural conclusion. Our camera has now been rotated, giving us our two vanishing points, but also tilted to look either up or down at the scene. This tilting makes our previously vertical lines angled, introducing a third vanishing point either high above, or far below the scene. The examples below both show this three point perspective, and you can see just how much more dramatic this makes the image feel.

Modeling from Photographic Reference in 3DsMax

Pratik Gulati on Oct 7th 2010

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