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The fact that the earth is a spheroid might have something to do with it. The horizon actually "is" curved. Barrel distortion in a wide angle lens might add to the effect but the fact remains the horizon is curved.
Take a ruler and hold it in front of you and you will see the horizon is not a straight line (unless you are a member of the "flat earth society")
since its a well known fact that the earth is flat and that you may fall off the edge if you sail too close, im pretty sure its to do with barrel distortion due to the complex configuration of elements in your lens.
tilt it down and you have a convex curve, tip it up and your have concave the opposite effect , these are commonly called barrel distortion and pincushion distortion and they can be pretty much eliminated in photoshop.
problems come with really complex lenses or cheap lenses stuck onto bridge cameras where you sometimes get compound distortion like a snake shaped horizon.
It's a typical occurrence with wide angle lenses !!.....with the horizon on the centre-line of the image it will appear
straight.......by tilting the camera down, to include f/g detail, the horizon is placed near the top of the image & appears
curved (down at each side).....tilt the camera up for a skyscape & the horizon is placed near the bottom of the image
& will curve the opposite way (up at each side).
The wider the lens, the more exaggerated the curvature.....I use an 8mm lens occasionally, & if I tilt the camera either
up or down from the horizontal the curvature of the horizon becomes extreme (see "Twisted Distortion" & "On top of
the World" in my PF..
)
It's just a 'characteristic' of wide lenses !.....but some slight curvature can be corrected in photoshop anyway, under the
'Filter > Correct Distortion' command.
Hope that helps a little ??.
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