Exercise 2 – Focus with a set aperture

This exercise is to take a series of photographs of the same scene with a small aperture focusing on three different distances.

I did this exercise while I was at Delapre Park earlier today.  To start with I did this exercise with a row of trees but it didn’t show the differences as much as I would like so I also did it using the fence running alongside the road.  I used my Sigma  70mm-200mm F2.8 lens to maximise the effect.

F2.8 1/400's ISO200 97mm

 

In this first image I focused on the nearest fence post.

F2.8 1/400's ISO200 97mm

 

For the second image I focused on the second fence post.

F2.8 1/400's ISO200 104mm

This third image the focus is on a further fence post.

Normally when I take a photograph I focus on the point of interest, e.g. in a portrait normally the eyes, in a landscape the point I want the eye to be drawn to.  In these instances out of the three images I prefer the first one where the focus is on the first fence post.   You can see all the detail in the wood and you can see enough detail, although blurry, to know there are more fence posts behind and makes you imagine what the grain is like on them.

This exercise clearly demonstrates the how the choice of focus point directly affects how an image is viewer, and how you can control which part of the image the view is drawn to.