Wide lens, small turbines

The wider the lens, the more landscape it fits into the picture, and the smaller the turbines look. To see them at their true size you must look at the image very closely: an A3 image taken with a 28 mm lens has to be held 33 cm from your eyes.

In practice people read a report or a screen at a comfortable distance, and the turbines look smaller than they will be.

Seen from above: what the lens takes in
Angle of view (single photo)
39,6°
Viewing distance for A3
58 cm
Turbine size (50 mm = ×1)
×1

Standard lens (50 mm). The standard in France and in Scotland, and the closest to human vision. An A3 image is viewed from 58 cm.

The developer’s viewpoint, or yours?

A photomontage only shows the view chosen by whoever made it. A viewpoint behind a hedge, a tree or a wall can hide almost all of a project, while a few metres away the view is wide open.

That is why we let you choose the viewpoints that matter to you: where you live, where you walk, where you stop to look at the landscape.

Seen from above: the road, the hedge and the turbines

From A, the hedge hides almost all the turbines. The photomontage looks reassuring.

The worst case is often a clear morning

How visible a wind farm is depends on the time of day and the weather. A photomontage taken at midday in hazy weather can be honest and still show as little as possible.

For a wind farm seen from the west, the worst case is often a clear morning, with the turbines backlit, or late afternoon, with the turbines lit up against a dark forest.

7 h
Contrast

In the morning the sun is behind the turbines: they stand out as dark silhouettes against a bright sky.

How tall is 241 metres?

Recent wind turbines are up to 241 m tall to the blade tip. Next to well-known buildings drawn to the same scale, it is easier to judge their presence in a landscape of villages and church spires.

50 m100 m150 m200 m250 mHouse9 mChurch45 mNotre-Dame69 mMontparnasse210 mTurbine241 m
A 241 m wind turbine is more than five times as tall as a village church spire.

Five questions to ask of a photomontage

Whether a photomontage comes from the developer or from another consultancy, these five questions quickly show whether it gives a fair picture of the project.

  1. Is everything documented?

    For each view: the date and time of the photo, the lens used, the exact position of the viewpoint, and a map.

  2. Are these the right viewpoints?

    Places people actually look at the landscape from, with no hedge, tree or post blocking the view in the foreground.

  3. Is the light the least favourable?

    Clear weather, with the turbines backlit or against a dark background, not a midday haze that makes them vanish.

  4. Are the size and position right?

    Turbine height and location, the lens, the distance the image should be viewed from, and the curve of the Earth for distant views.

  5. Does the image look real?

    Colours, shadows and the extras: access tracks, substations and power lines.

Send us the photomontages for a project: we’ll tell you what they show, and what they don’t.

Contact us

Based on the US guide “Evaluating Photosimulations for Visual Impact Assessment”.