Picture the scene: a beautiful summer’s day. In front of you is a field awash with greens and yellows and oranges and a wonderful blue sky. And there are sheep in the fields, grazing contentedly.

Or a beach scene, with boats floating serenely on the water, waves gently lapping their hulls as the sun shines down its splendour.

You take pictures but somehow the final images don’t look quite right. The sheep are walking downhill and the boats seem to be sliding out of the frame!

What is the problem? The horizon!

Wherever you go, whether it be Arizona or Adelaide, there is one indisputable fact. Horizons are level. Even though your brain can make mental adjustments when you see the scene before you, when it is captured on an image, it won’t look right if the horizon is not completely flat.

And it notices. Even minor aberrations in the horizon level will make a picture look “odd”. That is, unless there is something in the scene that obscures it.

You don’t need to be a genius to spot a wonky horizon and, thankfully, you don’t need to be a genius to correct or avoid it in your images. Landscapes and seascapes are the biggest areas of imagery that require pinpoint flat horizons.

Make sure yours are level.

Eric Hartwell runs the photography resource site http://www.theshutter.co.uk and the associated discussion forums as well as the regular weblog at http://thephotographysite.blogspot.com.

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