CAMERA/LENS TECHNIQUE -SHALLOW DEPTH OF FIELD

What is Depth of Field?

Depth of Field or DOF for short is a description of how much of your photograph is in focus. A shallow depth of field simply means that one specific area of your photo is sharp while other elements remain blurred.

One of the greatest uses of DOF is to single out your subject while at the same time reducing the effect of distracting background clutter. This can be used in almost any style of photography, portraits, sports, photojournalism, close-up and macro all use shallow DOF extensively.

The basic formula for shallow Depth of Field is to get as small of an f-stop setting as you can reasonably get away with in your photo. The smaller the f-stop, the larger the aperture. The aperture basically works the same way your pupils do, the more dilated it is, the more background is blurred. A good technique for getting shallow DOF is to start with the smallest f-stop your lens will allow. 2.8 or better works well for this style.

One important aspect can be uses of blurred or surrealistic imagery. With a good quality lens and an eye for the art in nature you can truly find ways to distort reality and bring your mind's eye into the photograph.

Some examples of shallow depth of field

My examples of a shallow depth of field

COMMERCIAL PICTURES

for my commercial picture in the objects assignment i had chosen to take a photograph of a perfume bottle and then edit the background to form a poster style picture. below is the original image and then the edited versions.

the original image

edited image i decided to reject this image as i thought the wave crashing on the right- hand side was a little distracting from the product.

edited image, i really liked this image but rejected it as i wasn't sure if the background was a little dark.

this is my final image.

i created this image in photoshop, i opened both images up then used the lasso tool to draw round the bottle i then used the magic wand to take away any of the original picture that i didnt want. the bottle was then draged on to the background and the image brought to size using transform (ctrl & t) i then added text which i wanted to represent the text on the bottle as close as possible to the top left had side.

DIGITAL DARKROOM 1 & 2 - ORGANISING & IMPORTING

Here's a demonstration of importing, organizing and naming files/folders

this is a screen capture of me uploading my images

this is a capture of all the images once loaded and down the left hand side there is a list of all the catalogs and file numbers.

this screen capture shows were captions can be made (down the right-hand side).

ARTISTS - RESEARCH

photographer: Imogen Cunningham
title: Pheonix Recumbent
year: 1968

photographer: Ansel Adams

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year:

photographer: Ansel Adams

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photographer: Eugene Atget

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year:

photographer: Eugene Atget
title:
year:

photographer: Ansel Adams

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photographer: Man Ray

title:

year:

Photographer: Man Ray

Title:

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Photographer: Blossfeldt

Title:

Year:

Photographer: Man Ray

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GROUP TASK-"from capture to print"

For the group task we were asked to produce one final photograph influenced by one of the following film titles:

• Breakfast at Tiffany's


• The Fountain


• Dead Man's Shoes


• Dog Day Afternoon


• A Clockwork Orange


• Sunset Boulevard


• Three Colours Red


• Stand by Me


• The Thin Red Line


• Rear Window

The photograph had to be delivered at 300dpi, jpeg. The deadline was 2pm

after carrying out research in the above film titles we decided as a group to us The Fountain as the basis for our photograph.

for part of our research we look at:

• the trailer for the film, see link below


• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDp-F3Y97ZQ


• brainstormed


• used word association


• resources available to us ie. studio & lighting


• environment suitable for the picture

the original film poster

our final photograph, which was mainly influenced by using word association and also the movie trailer where the queen of Spain give a ring to a conquistador which symbolises his pledge to finding the Elixir of mortality and the water throught the ring represents the fountain (film title).

our image was achieved by using flash lighting in the studio, the camera was set using a fast shutter speed so to freeze motion, althougt i would of liked to of had a slower shutter and a more rapid water flow which i think would of represented a fountain better but this most probably would of caused the hands to blur.

editing was taken place in lightroom where a vinette was added and then in photoshop we change it to black and white and left the ring in colour to draw your attention to it and make it the focal point of the picture.

WEEKLY PROJECT 3

This week we were asked to produce a picture that portrayed.......TREASURE


for my picture i had initially decided to collect some of the things which are precious to me and that i treasure, but whislt doing my macro shot for the systems and processes i thought about using the rings i was photographing as i treause them and they hold memories of a special day for me.



this picture was taken at home using a macro lens the light source was from a lamp and i used paper to diffuse the light. i edited it in lightroom using the temperature to warm the image and i also added a vinette to create a bit more atmosphere.
after editing thought i then decided that i wanted to use some of the portrait pictures that i had taken a few weeks previous of my two boys.




these are my two favourite pictures of the portraits shots i'd taken and they also work well together to.







these where taken using studio lighting which i had brought home and a large product tent which i sat the boys in, i used the black background to. the lighting was placed towards the left hand side and the other light was on the right towards the front of the tent. i used the product tent as its good for difusing the light

I then uploaded the pictures to photoshop and resized them, joined them together to make one picture. .....MY LITTLE TREASURES

OBJECTS ASSIGNMENT

for the objects assignment we were asked to produce 6 photographs which employ the following subject areas

• close-up/macro photography
  
• natural/organic forms
  
• commercial product
  
• highly refledtive subjects (chrome, glass etc)

the following pictures are my response to the above study images.



CLOSE UP PHOTOGRAPHY

MACRO PHOTOGRAPHY

NATURAL

ORGANIC

REFLECTIVE

COMMERCIAL