There is no doubt that 3D architectural visualization is an effective marketing strategy for architects to procure new business opportunities. More and more designers are intended to use 3D rendering services for their business development. But there is a question emerged, why my building looks tilted in the rendering? Today, we prepared a blog to elaborate on this common situation in the design industry.

Have you ever notice that when you walking among the buildings, the tall buildings appear to slant or distorted. Of course, the buildings are not literally twisted or falling, it is only looked distorted within a range of perception. Distortion can be solved by algorithms, but the deformation cannot be observed by the human eye is because our brains often make up for it.

The basic theory of making a 3D rendering is as same as taking photos. In reality, when taking a photo of buildings, especially the skyscraper, many buildings appear to be tilted. Why? It’s because of the effect of stereoscopic perspective. For example, raise your hand and move it toward your eyes, you will notice that our hand has blocked our vision completely. Generally speaking, it is the rule of the nearer the bigger, the further the smaller. Influenced by the stereoscopic perspective, it is commonplace to see tilted buildings in the photograph or in the 3D rendering. Now, we compare some photos with the 3D renderings made by AIMIR to get a more clear understanding of this question.


Here is an aerial shot provided by our client for making the surrounding
Human eye shot
Aerial view rendering
Human eye rendering
human eye rendering

It is because when we are taking the photo standing on the ground and tilting the camera upwards, the lens is closer to the bottom of the building and far away from its top, which makes the bottom looks huge and impressing than they really are whereas the tops feel more like dots since they are far away from us and look even smaller and further away. Thus, from a human’s perspective, a building from bottom to top is getting narrower and the outline of a building seems like slanting. If using the wide-angle lens to take a photo or using ultra-wide-angle, no matter what kind of building, they cannot escape from appearing distorted in the photo. The building looks like falling is because of the distortion. Distortion, edge flaring, ghost shadows are common phenomena while using the ultra-wide-angle lenses, which can’t be easily solved by algorithms. Therefore, ultra-wide-angle lenses are best for shooting landscapes but not for buildings.

wide-angle 3D rendering
wide-angle rendering

Are the slanting buildings in pictures inherently bad? The answer is: it depends. The slanting buildings prove to what we see from the human eye level, which has a more compelling visual effect and is in line with reality. We will make specific analysis according to different projects and the needs of our clients. AIMIR has worked with many clients for the past decade. There are some clients who asked for correction yet others are intended to show the actual effect of the tilted building according to the stereoscopic perspective. Regardless of what effect our clients want to achieve, they all can be easily autocorrected by 3D rendering software.

In a word, if you have any questions about leaning and verticality, please discuss with our project manager in the modeling stage, we will strive to reach your expectation. Please feel free to contact AIMIR if you have any questions about 3D architectural visualization. We are rather happy to help you with further details.

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