Moving the subject farther away form any items in the background will also give you a softer background, without adjusting your aperture. The farther away you are from the subject, the easier it is to get the subject in focus. One camera-lens setup focusing on an object six feet away may have about two inches in focus, but four inches with those same settings backing up to 12 feet from the subject. Understand the role of distance.ĭistance plays a big part in depth of field. Instead, try leaning against a wall or using your elbows to brace the camera. If you can use a tripod, great, but don’t worry if it’s not practical to bring one with you. There’s a small margin for error when using wide apertures, so you need to hold the camera as steady as possible, making sure that it doesn’t move in between focusing and taking the shot. Steady the camera.Ĭamera shake at wide apertures doesn’t just introduce blur, it can throw your focus off too. If you’re shooting a portrait, place the point on the subject’s eye, otherwise place the point on whatever part of the photo you want the sharpest. Then, use the arrow keys to move the focus box that you see inside the viewfinder (you may need to focus first, then use the arrows to get the focal point to move). Change the focus area mode by heading into your camera’s menu, or using the physical controls if your camera has one. By using single point autofocus, you tell the camera exactly where to focus. The default on your camera typically selects either the object that’s closest to the camera, or what’s in the center of the frame. Instead of using the center focal point, take advantage of the single point autofocus mode.

Don’t risk a soft photo by moving the camera after you’ve locked the focus. But with a wide aperture, even an inch of movement can make the subject just out of focus. At narrow apertures, you typically have several inches and sometimes even feet before the subject will be soft. While this trick can work great in many instances, it’s not ideal for using wide apertures.

Often, a great way to photograph a subject off-center is to focus with the subject in the center, then recompose with the focus still locked. Does that mean you shouldn’t shoot with wide apertures? Of course not, but there are some tricks to mastering those shots with a shallow depth of field. In order to throw that background out of focus, you run a good chance of accidentally getting the subject a bit too soft too, since there’s a much narrower range of distances that will remain sharp. Wide apertures capture great bokeh and smooth backgrounds-but they can be particularly difficult to work with.

Big aperture