Depth of field

Posted by on Thursday, March 24th, 2011

I’ve been taking a photography class. This week our assignment was to keep certain variables the same, such as the shutter speed and the distance to object, as well as the lighting while changing the aperture setting to increase or decrease depth of field.

Now, I say that as if it was easy.

Ha.

I mean, it was easy to take the pic… just a matter of setting this and setting that and SNAP! but…. the resulting image wasn’t that great. I must’ve  taken several dozen before I had any that made the depth of field quite obvious.

Here’s what I mean:

Shallow depth of field

Shutter speed = 1/6 ; focal distance =85mm; Fstop= 5.6

Wide depth of field

Shutter speed= 1/6; Focal distance= 85mm; Fstop= 36

For all practical purposes, that seems to show a very subtle difference. The shallow depth of field photo has a very clear flower in the front, while the words on the pig are slightly out of focus. The photo with the wide depth of field is exactly the same, with only the aperture changed – and more of the photograph is clearer. You can even read the words on the pig, right?

I can see the difference even more in these photos:

Shallow depth of field

Shutter speed= 1/30; Focal distance= 80mm; Fstop= 5.3

Wide depth of field

Shutter speed = 1/30; Focal distance – 80mm; Fstop = 36

Now…. I can see the depth of field here! If you look at at the background, the trees and bushes are more fuzzy in the top photo because its a shallow depth of field. Conversely, the second photo shows the bushes more clearly. (Of course, we can all see that my subject (aka beautiful Beebo) is a wee bit out of focus also. I remembered after this photo was shown in class WHY that happened. Duh. If you have your camera on a tripod (which I did) and you leave the VR (vibration reduction) turned ON, your camera is expecting a bit of movement. And if it doesn’t find any movement (because it’s sitting stable on the tripod) it’ll MAKE a little movement. Duh. Isn’t that the craziest thing?? So now, I have to remember to turn that OFF when I use my tripod. Yeah, right. ;)

You do realize I will NEVER remember any of this later, right? Nope, not a chance.

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Filed in Around the house,Me,Randomness,Weirdness in my world | 6 dorito bits so far

6 Dorito Bits to “Depth of field”

  1. Tracieon 24 Mar 2011 at 6:58 am 1

    Sounds like you are learning something from your classs!! Good for you!!

  2. Shannonon 24 Mar 2011 at 7:20 am 2

    So cool that you are learning so much! Can’t wait till this summer when you teach ME! :)

  3. Beccaon 24 Mar 2011 at 8:39 am 3

    I love your photographs! You will get the hang of it, it sounds like there is a lot to learn. Keep up the great work! :-)

  4. Vonnieon 24 Mar 2011 at 9:16 am 4

    Wow! Keep up the good work! I wish I had the camera AND the training.

  5. Lenaon 25 Mar 2011 at 1:34 pm 5

    Awesome Job! I Love shallow depth of field photos. Learn Lots and Share! :-)

  6. Chrison 27 Mar 2011 at 4:32 pm 6

    Good for you! Really like the depth of field in Beebo’s 1st pic. You have a budding job as a portrait photographer! Nice work!

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