Bokeh background5/8/2023 Now, let’s talk for a minute about kites and huts. There are many ways to determine hyperfocal distance for a given lens at a given focal distance and aperture combo on your camera, including online calculators, pocket charts and sliders, iOs apps, and my favorite method, hands-on field experimentation and dead reckoning combined with experience. The whole key to achieving background separation is to ensure you are not over the hyperfocal limit. And this, too is dependent on the same factors as above: focal length, focal distance, aperture, sensor size, and subject to background distance. This is called infinity focus, or the hyperfocal distance. The depth of field is extremely shallow even at a wide-open F6.3, and the small angle of view renders the background a few yards from the subject incredibly abstract.Īnd conversely, every lens, from the widest wide angle to the longest supertele, can capture a shot where pretty much everything appears to be in sharp focus, without any background separation. And finally, here’s the same composition captured at 1:2.9 macro on the Sigma 18-250mm DC Macro OS HSM at 250mm. In fact, at F2.8, only the edge of the seed pod is on the focal plane. notice how the background is even more defocused due to the very close focusing and large sensor. Now this shot was made with the Sigma 70mm F2.8 EX DG HSM at about 1:2.5 magnification on the Canon EOS 5D, a full-frame camera. There’s a relationship between sensor size and depth of field. This is made with the Sigma 18-250mm F3.5-63 DC Macro OS HSM at 43mm at F5 on the Rebel T3i, which is an APS-C sensor. Now, interestingly, compare this shot to the one directly above. Notice the differneces in the depth of field and field of view here, despite the very similar composition. And here is the same scene shot at F2.8 with the Sigma 30mm F2.8 EX DN on the same E-PL2 camera. Here, with the Sigma 19mm F2.8 EX DN wide open at F2.8 on an Olympus E-PL2 for an equivalent 38mm focal length on the four-thirds sensor, the background is a bit more abstract, but still very recognizable as a pond. There’s a sweeping field of view, and a softer, but totally recognizable background, at F4.5 at 1/1000 at ISO 100 on Reb T3i. Here these two seed pods are mere inches from the lens of the Sigma 8-16mm ultrawide zoom. ![]() Every lens, even the widest ultrawides and fisheyes, are capable of isolating the subject from the background. ![]() We do have to start with a bit of the technicals to get to the creative applications, but we’ll try to keep keep it as short, and as easy to grasp as possible.Įvery lens for SLRs (and compact mirrorless, too) that Sigma produces, from the widest wide angle to the longest supertelephoto, can be focused to isolate the subject from the background (and foreground, for that matter.) But the degree of recognition of background elements is dependent upon a number of factors: focal length, focal distance, aperture, sensor size, and subject to background distance. SIgma 35mm F1.4 DG HSM at 1/320 F1.4 ISO 100 on Canon Rebel T3i. Selective focus at a wide aperture gives shallow depth of field for background separation and cool holiday light effects photography. While we’ll obviously be featuring a number of Sigma lenses in this how-to, much of the information here is universal. Indoors and out, the Christmas trees bedecked with tiny lights, Menorahs, and decidedly secular seasonal displays that brighten the world each December present the perfect opportunity to experiment, explore and create. The holiday season is a great time to make photos with gorgeously softened backgrounds and shallow depth of field for painterly, creative, and festive results.
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