Quote:
Originally Posted by Darrell
Perfect sense. Will I lose that cool blur of the background though if I raise the F stop?
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Quote:
Originally Posted by The Professor
It depends on how much you raise the number (which lets in less light), it depends on the lens, and it depends on other compositional factors. But generally, yes -- as you raise the f-stop, depth of field increases and that background blur (called bokeh [click the link]) goes down. |
Darrell,
that is what makes it so much fun.
It is all a combination of speed with which you take the picture (more speed, less light, less speed, more light) coupled with aperture (the lower the f stop number, the more light but less depth of field, the greater the f number, the less light but more depth of field/more sharpness).
For example, with manual focusing medium format cameras that most wedding photographers used in my days, we use to set the lens to f 8, adjust shutter and flash as necessary for that f stop and hence they can set their range on the lens to a focus of 15 feet and close their eyes when shooting couples walking into a church or hall. There is no way anything within an 8 ft focus range will not be clear.
So, it all depends on what you seek. In the photos you posted, I agree with them comments that you needed to adjust your depth of field to better capture ones eye to your subject. By increasing your f stop and by reducing your shutter speed, you would have accomplished the same lighting result.
While you learn, I recommend you go with the aperture priority setting on your dial and play with higher f stops. As you do that, the camera will automatically reduce your shutter to compensate for your new setting. After you have played with that a while, you can go to full manual mode and control both as you see fit for the result you seek.