If you wondered how to make the background in the photo blurry so that using the correct focus only the most important element in the photo is highlighted, then you will find useful information from this article :).
Blurred background and foreground. My photo. F2.0, 50mm, ISO 200, 4000 ′, Helios-81n, Nikon D40
The blurred background in the photo can be in two main ways:
1. Using the camera settings
2. Using software
Blurred photo
On the blurring power and creating bokeh is the strongest The following physical parameters affect:
- Geometric aperture lens, it’s the same aperture. The smaller the F number, the finer the depth of field (depth of sharply depicted space) and the more the background and background are blurred.
- The focal length of the lens. The larger the focal length of the lens, the more the background will be blurred.
- Focusing distance to the subject. The shorter the focus distance (the distance between the camera and what you shoot), the more blurred the background.
- The distance between the subject and the background. The farther the background from the subject, the more blurry it is.
- Optical design (more specifically affects the nature of the blur). The better the optical design, the more pleasant the bokeh :)
- Indirectly affects matrix size the camera. More than matrix size, the more viewing angle and the closer you need to get to the subject, which, in fact, rests on the 3rd point. Therefore, they argue that full-format cameras blur the background more strongly than cropped. Speaking rudely, the more crop factorthe harder it is to blur the background.
- Also, blurring is affected by special nozzles and filters on the lens. Here an example of a simple home-made Center Spot filter.
You can also blur the background using special graphic editors. But, of course, a more natural and natural blurring of the background occurs directly when shooting. In order to blur the background with the camera as much as possible, you need to configure it correctly.
What is the best way to set up your camera
1. Need to maximize aperture... F-number is usually responsible for the aperture. It is very convenient to take photos with a blurred background in the aperture priority mode, which is indicated on the camera mode dial by the letters'A' or 'Av'. Open - means to decrease the F number. For example, the F3.5 aperture value is greater than the F5.6 aperture value. If, for example, the camera is set to F8.0, then to open the aperture you need to lower it to the minimum allowable, usually F5.6, F3.5, F2.8. On fast lenses, even F1.8 and F1.4 can be set. For example, on a piece of paper I printed “This is the background” and to blur it I first shot at F / 1.4, and in order to develop it more, I shot at 16.0
The effect of the aperture on the depth of field and on the blurriness of the background
2. You need the maximum focal length on your existing lens (that is, unscrew the zoom to maximum). Than more will be the focal length, the easier it will be to blur the background. To do this, you should make the maximum approximation on a digital camera, and on a SLR - simply transfer the lens to the focal length with the maximum number. For example, if you have a standard '18 -55mm 'class lens, then it will be best to blur the background at 55mm (at the maximum extreme position with the largest number of focal lengths). On a regular digital camera (aka 'soapbox'), sometimes you can simply turn on the macro mode, while the lens itself is set to the maximum focal length.
Sample photo with blurry background
3. Finally, get as close as possible to the subject you are shooting. The closer the subject is to the lens, the stronger the blur. In this case, the lens will focus closer and closer. Just see that the frame is well-arranged, otherwise you can shoot something completely different from what was planned.
Sample photo with blurry background
Boke
Of course, many have heard of bokeh. Bokeh is the nature of the background blur, including its intensity. If the lens blurs the background well, then the lens is said to have good bokeh. There is a lot of debate about the beauty of bokeh - which lens is better or worse. Bokeh has its own plasticity, distortions, twisting, etc., the feeling of beauty of bokeh comes with experience and each has its own.
Sample photo with blurry background. Soft bokeh
Chasing bokeh
The pursuit of better bokeh is a comparison of a huge number of shots, all sorts of arguments in favor of a particular lens, which leads to the pursuit of fast and long-focus lenses, which cost a lot of money.
Sample photo with blurry background
Which lens blurs the background the most
Coming from previous thoughts, the lens with a large focal length and large aperture... For example, 50mm lenses blur the background well - lenses with a XNUMXmm focal length and a large aperture F1.4, the short telephones of the 135mm F2.0 type blur the background even more strongly, the 200 mm F2.0 telephones are even stronger, and so on. But the longer the focal length and the larger aperture, the more expensive the lens. Therefore, usually amateurs stop at a fifty-kopeck piece of the 50mm F1.4 type, or on a dark, but long-focus telephoto lens of the 70-300mm F4.0-5.6 type. Which lens is best for you - it depends only on your personal considerations.
Sample photo with blurry background
More thoughts about blurring
If you delve into the subtleties of what affects the bokeh more, then it is difficult to reach a consensus, but please note that sometimes the focal length affects more than aperture the lens. Also, the blur of the background is indirectly affected by the size of the sensor for the same lens. So on full-frame cameras they say that blur is stronger with the same lens. The depth of field of the lens does not change - it is a physical quantity. So what's the catch? And the catch is that the focusing distance of the lens changes to compose the same frame. And of course, the farther the background is from the subject, the more it will blur. By the way, short-focus lenses with large aperture it’s better to blur the background, which is close to the subject.
Background blur in a full-length portrait
Photoshop will also help
If the picture is taken and you want to blur the background, then Photoshop or another program will come to the rescue. There are a lot of blur methods and I will not dwell on them.
What is blurring the front and back (far) plan in general?
Conclusions:
For maximum blur, shoot with the widest aperture and the maximum focal length of your lens. In this case, the further the distance between the background and the subject is and the closer the distance between the camera and the subject, the more the background will be blurred. If the camera cannot provide a normal blur, you can finish it in a special program, such as Photoshop.
↓↓↓ Like it :) ↓↓↓ Thank you for your attention. Arkady Shapoval.
I think that the Central Control Center is not a toy, but a complex (from the technical point of view) device. It's better to read the instructions first. And not once or twice! A lot of questions will disappear immediately.
Or do as a friend of mine does - shoot in A mode.
PS but it’s pointless to buy a CZK for Mode A.
Arkady, once again, thank you for your efforts. I decided to re-read your article again (mainly for the sake of beautiful photos).
but how to make the background rosimit on OLYMPUS c-750 &?
Arkady, thanks for the article.
I don’t sit on social networks, so I just sent a link to the site to all my amateur photographers.
Honestly, after reading, I got confused to death with the influence of the focal length on the blurriness of the background. I understand the effect of aperture on sharpness. Is there a clear dependence on the change in focal length? That is, I just want to understand the logical reason for the change in the blurriness when changing focus, because Now a qualitatively blurred background is obtained only in macro mode (D5100, whale lens 18-55), i.e., as I understand it, at a minimum focus. Once, by chance, a beautiful bokeh came out with a very distant background and without macro mode, focus 35-45. You write that the focal length should be maximum. I would like to understand whether it is possible in other shooting modes to make bokeh and portraiture with a blurry background, or what conditions must be observed to ensure blurriness and which focus to set. Like I read all the comments, I did not find a similar question. Thank you in advance.
the longer the focal length of the lens, the stronger the blur effect will be. This was mentioned more than once in the article. On the fingers, this can be explained by the following review: if you take your 18-55, then at a 30mm focal length the blur will have less effect than at a 55mm focal length (for the same shot with the same framing of objects in the photo).
That's all, I get it. I confused the concepts of focal length and focus distance. One question remains. Why does blurring increase with increasing focal length (read an article about bokeh)?
When you change the focus distance, the degree of blur also changes. Longer-focus lenses have a different focusing distance to create a picture with the same proportions as with short-focus lenses.
Thanks, Arkady, I understood everything =)
I'm a newbie. I have a Nikon D3200 18-55 kit. Is it possible to describe in detail how I can configure it so that the background is blurry ???
Turn on macro)
Hello Arkady !!! Recently, my wife and I bought a PANASONIC GF5KA mirrorless camera (3,5: 5,6) (14-42) with a diameter of 46. I shot 20 days on the machine. Then something fascinated me, and began to watch YouTube, photography lessons. My opinion and courses are not needed. There are quite understandable videos. In theory, I now very much understood about aperture, shutter speed and ISO. I would also like to try to shoot with a blurry background, but I haven’t yet gone out into the countryside, there was no opportunity to experiment. In principle, in theory, I understand how to make a blurred background.
The other day I was dealing with a camera, its functions, I found where ISO, exposure, aperture are manually adjusted. And here is my question:
1) When I twisted the aperture and shutter speed, the zoom saw that the maximum aperture was 3,5. Then I experimented, I don’t remember how I did it, but the aperture value was 2 !!! And now I can’t reproduce it !!!
Please explain in theory, is this possible, or was there a glitch ???
2) According to my lens data above, what blur will I have in your opinion ???
3) What is the advantage of DSLRs in photo quality if the mirror does not participate during the shutter opening ??? For example, I have a mirrorless mirror with a normal matrix 17,3 / 13. and my opinion is of good quality. Of course, I understand the answer to this question is long, but still please answer briefly !!!!
Thank you in advance.
The main difference is the size of the matrix, and this affects many things described here - https://radojuva.com.ua/2011/05/size-of-matrica/. If you have PANASONIC GF5KA (3,5: 5,6), then F / 2.0 could not be.
Thank you!
Arkady, I wish you to be above these stupid questions. I am new, but the article is written nowhere more clearly. RESPECT !!!
Thank you very much for the article! Your site is a great helper for a beginner!
For a long time I was looking for a full-fledged resource where you can comprehend the theoretical basics of photography, but for the most part there were scattered articles, but here I found everything I was looking for. Although you write accessible, but I am still very confused in all these meanings and their interdependencies, and only with practice does understanding of how everything works come.
It occurred to me that all the subtleties of focusing and bokeh can be compared with the work of the eye, this facilitates understanding. The closer the subject is to the eye, the more blurred the background appears.
Hello, I recently bought a canon 60d 55mm mirror. Problems with night shooting. Please tell me in what mode should I take pictures and how? For some reason, there is no clarity.
Hello Arkady. Your article was very helpful. I have a Nikon D90, I try to take pictures with a blurry screen in P, AS, M modes with aperture, shutter speed, ISO, exposure - everything is clear what it is and why. The blurred background does not always turn out, and sometimes the photo does not come out at all - it's just a black screen, it happens when I take a picture it does not immediately react (I press the button to the end) three or four seconds pass and then the process ends, hands naturally twitch, tremble and the picture comes out blurry ... Please, tell me what to do with it !!!
Arkady, thank you very much for the article! Everything is very accessible and clearly explained.
Yesterday I got the first Canon EOS 1100D SLR camera, and today I already got the first frames with a blurry background!
Arkady, by chance on the Internet discovered your magnificent and intelligible lessons. Thank you so much, we will comprehend the art of photo-hafiy with your help!
I have Nikon coolpix 510p, I set A mode, I set the aperture F 3 (the very minimum), but I still don't blur the background ...% (
Hello. Help please !!! I bought s and a little e-mail (the first one for me) read the entire instruction, read your article, but nothing happens with blurring the background. I don’t know, it’s not possible that I’m putting something on it. Sony a 58 camera, lens 18-55 standard. Help me how to do better, or maybe there is where to read exactly who uses it. I could not really find anything. Thank you in advance!!! (litter for errors I write from the phone, not very convenient)
Arkady, please tell me on which lens it will be possible to blur the background more 50mm1.8g or 18-140mm f3.4-5.6g? Thanks!
Can you please tell me, I got confused in the edge (((((I very bravely started to shoot weddings on d 90,18, 105-35. But I understand that this is soooo not what I need, Now, for a start, I am considering 50 or fifty dollars) a focal length of 35 in an apartment is not enough, only close-ups are placed in the frame, 35 is better, for a registry office and apartment 50 for a portrait and a street 35 is needed ... .50 is criticized (poor sharpness, purple halo ... ) I understand that 35 will climb the walls, but scolds XNUMX. Write your opinion please!
Please tell me what to do if the aperture does not fall lower than f / 5
Hello! Thank you very much for the informative articles, everything is very accessible and interesting. On this topic, the following question arose: if the lens with a variable focal length 18-55 and, accordingly, the aperture is also variable 3.5-5.6 What is preferable to photograph with a larger focal length or with a smaller aperture? I apologize if such a question already existed, maybe I didn’t. Thanks in advance for your reply!
In this case, a better focal length and a lower aperture are better.
Thank you, a very interesting article and clearly written!
Rebyat, mne naoborot nuzhno chto by fon ne razmyvalsya, kto nibud rabiraetsya? Mne nuzhno fotkat edu tak chto by vsya kartina vyxodila chistoi.Photoapparat Canon 600 D objektiv 18-55mm
Thanks a lot to the author for the article. Today I purchased a Nikon D5200 kit 18-105mm I think that soon everything will work out and the background will be blurred)))
Help. I have a Nikon D5100 18-55. I put Mode A, F 5,6 and the lens at 55 and it doesn’t work out, what’s wrong ?????
Masha, the F number should be minimal for blurring the background, it’s 3.5 for your lens, if the memory doesn’t change :)
Thank you, everything is very intelligible and affordable !!