by Russell Burden Here's How To Maximize Your Depth Of Field
In landscape photography, it¹s essential to record all elements in focus. From the point closest to the camera extending to infinity, everything should be sharp. This requires the maximum amount of depth of field. Depth of field is controlled by three fundamentals: the working aperture, the focal length of the lens, and the subject distance from the camera. Knowing how these fundamentals interact is critical to maximizing depth of field. In the two landscape photographs that accompany this Here¹s How, I used a small aperture, a wide angle lens, and the near subject distance from the camera was approximately ten feet.
Lenses: The wider the angle of the lens, the more inherent depth of field. For example, if a subject is photographed with both a 50mm and 28mm lens using the same size aperture, the image taken with the 28mm lens would have more depth of field. This is partly due to the wider angle of view of the 28mm lens along with the smaller diaphragm opening of the wider lens. With an aperture of f11, on the 28mm lens, the lens opening is one eleventh of 28 as opposed to one eleventh of 50 with the 50mm lens.
PHOTO: Russ Burden
Aperture: The smaller the aperture (f16 / f22 / f32), the greater the depth of field. For example, if a 50mm lens remains focused at ten feet and it's set to an aperture of f1.4, there will be foreground and background material that will be out of focus. If that same lens is stopped down to f5.6, some of the background and foreground will come into focus. At f11, the depth of field will be further increased. At f22 or f32, it will be maximized.
Subject Distance: The closer the subject is to the camera, the less depth of field. For example, if a 50mm lens is focused on a subject that's only a few feet away from the camera, the background would be considerably out of focus. At the same aperture, if you were to move ten feet away from the same subject, the depth of field would be increased.
PHOTO: Russ Burden
With all of the above in mind, for a given composition, to achieve the greatest amount of depth of field use your widest angle lens, stop it down to its smallest aperture, and place the camera as close to the nearest subject element that still will allow it and infinity to be in focus.
