help:2 subjects close up 1 focused 1 non-focused…how?

[miky]

hello everyone,

im not sure if i can explain properly what im trying to say…anyway…i was trying to recreate a very common type of shot: two people, close up of their faces only. the focus was first os subject A while subject B was out of focus in the background. then the cameraman changes the focusing and subject B becomes on focus while A becomes out of focus…

this was done without any zooming just by changing the focus…

if anyone manage to understand what i mean could you please give me any tips on how to achieve this?

i tried a few times but did not really manage to…

thanks

[Rob]

This is called a rack focus. You want to have yourapertureopen (around F2.0 or so), and be zoomed in all the way (or as much as possible) as well as have as much distance between subject A and Subject B and also a good distance between the subjects and the camera.

To compensate for opening theapertureall the way and letting in all that light, you will need to turn on yourneutraldensity filter if your camera has one or boost the shutter speed.

[birdcat]

Another quick and dirty way is to use your zoom – I know you don’t want to zoom in or out as you are doing this but if you move the camera father away and zoom in to a longer fixed focal length to compensate, you’ll lower your depth of field and be able to selectively focus better (do this with an ND filter and open up your aperture as Rob suggested and you should be able to do selective focus quite well).

[miky]

thanks, i will try it out and let you know!

cheers

[Author]

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