Creating shallow
Depth of field in Point and shoot camera
Wednesday,
October 05, 2011
3:08 PM
Main draw back of a point and shoot
camera is inability to blur background due to deep depth of field caused by the
narrow aperture and small sensor size . But with some effort and understanding
we can achieve shallow depth of field in point and shoot cameras to some
extent.
 |
| Taken with a Olympus Point and shoot, in sports mode |
We know that
- Wider the aperture the
shallower the DOF.
- Longer the focal length
shallower the DOF.
- Closer the focusing distance
shallower the DOF.
Thus to achieve the
shallowest DOF possible in a camera we should
- Have the widest aperture set
in camera (i.e., the lowest f/number)
- Have the lens completely
zoomed in
- Select a subject that can be
placed as close as possible (but far enough for the camera to focus)
 |
| Taken with a Olympus Point and shoot, in sport mode |
Choosing the widest
aperature in a point and shoot
Most
of the point and shoot cameras won't allow you to set the aperature of the
lens. It does that automatically, but there are ways to make the camera to
select the widest aperatures they are
- By setting the camera in
Portrait shooting mode.
- By setting the camera in
sports mode.
In
most cameras when shooting in portrait mode, the camera tries to keep the
aperature wide open.But this is not the case in some cameras. In that scenario
selecting sports shooting mode the camera will shoot at highest shutter speed possible thus it
will force the camera to use widest aperatures .
The
last condition that has to be fullfilled in order to get very shallow depth of
field is to shoot a subject at closest distance possible. But at distance more
than minimum focusing distance of a particular camera.
And
don't forget to put the camera on macro mode.
 |
| Taken with a Olympus Point And shoot, in portrait mode |
Summing
all up , to get shallow DOF on a point and shoot camera
- Place the camera as close as possible and use
macro mode
- Select Portrait shooting mode
,if it doesn't work use Sports shooting mode.
- Finally Half press shutter
button when it searches for focus , press further more when background is out of focus(do it
quickly).