#Bokeh photo how to

Everything surrounding this focal point will be blurred, thus creating bokeh. A large aperture decreases depth of field, dramatically isolating focus on a narrow part of your subject. To be more specific, use the largest aperture (smallest f-number) available on your lens.

#Bokeh photo how to

What follows are some tips on how to bring together a number of factors that will help you achieve the “best” possible bokeh in your shots. The lens, of course, isn’t the only thing that plays a role in creating bokeh. Hu Jieqiong by Jonathan Kos-Read, on Flickr There’s no right or wrong here lenses are tools that you have to learn and master in order to make the most of them.

It’s no different than knowing at which apertures or focal lengths your lens vignettes some photographers like vignetting and use it to great artistic effect. You probably have your own ideas of what constitutes good bokeh, so it is important to understand how the lens you are using renders blur. Which brings us back to the point of subjectivity. It is in situations like these where the quality of the lens will have a more noticeable impact on the quality of the bokeh, but there is no such thing as a perfect bokeh lens. There are scenes that just sort of lend themselves to producing smooth, creamy bokeh even with not-so-great lenses, while other scenes - such as those with harsh lighting or lots of specular highlights - present a much greater challenge. Lenses do, however, possess certain design characteristics that affect how the bokeh is rendered in photo. ♥ The Drongo Love ♥ Happy Valentine's Day ♥ by VinothChandar, on FlickrĪs you may have gathered from the brief definition above, bokeh is a feature of a photograph, not necessarily a feature of a lens. Accordingly, bokeh is a rather subjective idea one person’s opinion of “good” bokeh may not fall in line with another person’s opinion. What matters is the quality of the blur, not the amount. It’s one of the most obsessed-over words in photography, from how to pronounce it to how to “make it.” It often seems as if too many photographers - primarily newer practitioners - have placed a disproportionate premium on the concept of bokeh without fully understanding what it is.īokeh originates from the Japanese word meaning “blur” or “haze.” As it relates to photography, bokeh refers to the aesthetic quality of a photograph’s out of focus areas, including the specular highlights that most easily reveal a lens’ aperture shape (often rendered as the bright circles that people so love) it does not refer to the blur caused by subject or camera movement.īokeh is not a quantitative concept unlike lens aperture or shutter speed, bokeh has no associated system of measurement.