First attempt at DOF

[Church Rat]

I'm new to all of this, so, here is my first shot trying to get DOF.

I used Shutter Priority and set ISO to 250.

I also wanted to find out if the camera was able to capture the dust on the keyboard, and it actually does :0)

Is it okay? :blushing:

 

[Church Rat]

bump

anyone?

 

[deanx0r]

If you want to control the DOF, then you want to control the aperture of your lens. The wider the aperture is, the narrower/shorter the DOF is.

 

[nomade]

Indeed you have to use aperture priority, you said you set iso to 250 which is something I haven't heard of yet, so probably you set the shutter speed to 1/250 sec. The shutter speed is totally irrelevant anyway, you could get better out of such an experiment, try again, and set the aperture wide, like 2.8 or something and then change it bit by bit till you get to your minimum aperture. You'll get more concept then.

 

[hyakuhei]

The easiest way to play with DOF is simply set your camera to "Aperture Priority", set the aperture to a nice wide setting (The smaller the number the bigger the setting) and go take some snaps!

 

[crownlaurel]

I was having a hard time getting my aperture open wider, but I found that putting it on "A" to set the aperture and then switching to "M" to set my other settings worked for me. I may be mistaken but putting it on "S" priority may not let you adjust the aperture on your own as it puts shutter speed as its main concern.

If you're using a kit lens (like me), you may not have a 2.8 aperture. In that case, you have to also adjust your focal length (again w/ the kit lens, this is limited...mine is 55mm at its longest) and your distance from the subject.


I found this website helpful: http://smad.jmu.edu/dof/

 

[Church Rat]

Thanks for the information everyone.

So, now I'm going to take some pictures on Aperture Priority.

Only reason I had it on Shutter Priority was because the room was not well lit, so I wanted to make sure the the shutter would fire fast without delay. But, I see I've still got a lot to learn.

crownlaurel, you are right that I don't have a 2.8 aperture. My lens only goes up to 3.5. However, I won a lens off ebay that will be able to achieve 2.8. So I'll be back with some more proper DOF picture later! Thanks again to all who answered.