Depth of Field. The smaller DOF, the less in in focus, showing less depth, just... blurriness.
The greater DOF has more stuff in focus, so if a person is standing in front of a mountain or something, instead of blurring out the background behind them, you can use a smaller aperture creating a greater DOF to see all the scenic shizzle.
hmmmm...either im way to tired to understand or i just screwed my brain up big time trying to think about it. i guess theres lots more I have to ead about this photography eh. know of any good websites a guy can go look at and learn?
ok, i now understand. my digital canon A70 does not have nearly enough focal adjustment to tkae a picture of someone and get the mountain in the background focused to. mine only goes to 8, and i bet it would be better for like 22 or something like that for a mountain shot eh? But now i think i kinda understand whats going on with this depth stuff.
A good way to get good depth is just use the camera on infinty focus, but say you have to focus on something (not far enough away to be infinity) and you're using a wide aperture, you're gonna have background diffusion.
The thing with digital cameras is that the actual focal length of the lens (not 35mm equiv) is really like 5mm-15mm or something, since it's the actual focal length that creates the background diffusion, you can compare that to using a 5mm lens on a 35mm camera, not likely to get any background blur unless you're doing a macro shot. That's why if you get a digital camera with a big lens (like a 14-70mm or something), you can put it on 70mm, which is like a 35mm equivalent of 300mm, you can get the same background blur as a 70mm lens on a 35mm SLR.
Yeah, that didn't really apply to the other guy, but, for the guy with the A70, I have an A70 too, and I I'd just say to stand back farther or don't use the zoom or something, then you'll get both the background and foreground in focus.
