Bokeh

[I Am Luna]

So...what is Bokeh?

Bokeh is actually derived from a Japanese word for blurry, boke. Bokeh is when an area of an image is out-of-focus by using shallow depth of field. Getting into depth of field would take awhile, but I'm happy to talk about it if someone wants to know. Well, bokeh is used for mainly portraits but you can use it to just show emphasize on one area of a photo.

With point and shoot cameras you can get bokeh by setting the dial to the "Portrait" settings OR (and this would be better) if it has an Aperture Priority (Av) setting, set it to the lowest f-number (or largest aperture; yes yes, its backwards). See, the thing is, we are making the lens OPEN WIDE so circle of confusion are larger then the human eyes resolution. Crazy huh? Well, how large can your lens open up? Its called an F-Stop and its written on your lens. Its written F/2.8 or F/11 but on the lens it is typed 1:1.8 or 1:2.8, just replace the 1: with F. The lower the number, the larger the aperture or lens opening.

Well, enough talk, lets see it in action shall we? Notice the backgrounds of each photo and how it changes into focus.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3165/2901102349_6c1318a996_o.jpg

I had to bump the ISO up for the last two because I wasn't getting enough light in due to the high f-stop or.... small aperture. Good, we are learning.

Alright, any questions? If not, get out there and show me a nice example of shallow depth of field or... Bokeh! Happy shooting!

[Carl]

I was reading about this last night. A higher aperture (lower number) also seems to be better for night time pictures. I took a few test pictures and the pictures at a higher aperture did indeed look quite a bit better (wish I knew that a couple nights ago). For day time landscape pictures, a lower aperture (higher number) is better so you get a larger depth of field. At least, that's what I read.

[Stephie098]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3231/2596821406_fbea5f1fae.jpg