# Bokeh with 35 lens



## bunny99123 (Dec 25, 2012)

I have been wanting a Minolta 50mm 1.7 lens because the  bokeh is awesome. Hubby bought me a Sony 35mm lens. Either I am doing something wrong or you don't get much of the effect. Help please!


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## cosmonaut (Dec 25, 2012)

Can you post a picture? What camera and settings?


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## Derrel (Dec 25, 2012)

Well, a 35mm does not "magnify" the background very much, so out of focus points of light are rendered somewhat small. So...no "great big, giant, round, out-of-focus Christmas lights" will occur, as with a 300mm lens shot outdoors, for example. Also, the degree of out-of-focus-ness from a 35mm lens is not as extreme as say, the degree of out-of-focus one gets when using a 200mm lens...the longer lens has shallower depth of field and also has a somewhat exotic difference in that the longer lens has more of what is called "background blur".

With a 35mm lens set to f/1.8 or f/2 or thereabouts, there is a **somewhat shallow** depth of field if the subject is fairly close to the camera, and so if the background is relatively far behind, the background will be rendered **somewhat** out of focus...so...


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## bunny99123 (Dec 25, 2012)

Thank you Darrel.  I have seen a lot of pics taken with 50mm Minolta, and it has excellent effect.  You did a good job explaining it, but when I use my lens with  an aperture of a 4.5 to 5.6 70-210mm I can get the effect, but the focal point is not sharp enough.  I understand it, but kinda confused? How can a 50mm, but not a 35mm lens not have close to the same effect?  Here is my first picture.  No alter except size. f-stop 3.5, shutter 1/60, ISO 250, aperture 1.7 and focal length 52. My friends kitty.


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## fjrabon (Dec 25, 2012)

you're too far away from the cat and the background is too close.

also, you REALLY don't understand aperture & f/stop, because they're the same thing.  You said your aperture is 1.7 and f/stop is 3.5.  

what matters when it comes to amount of blur is magnification, distance to background and f/stop.

Basically if you want maximum blur, you want to be zoomed in as close to your subject as possible, have the background as far away as possible with your f/stop as low as possible.


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## KmH (Dec 25, 2012)

Depth-of-field (DoF) and 'bokeh' are different things.

DoF is adjustable. Bokeh isn't.


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## bunny99123 (Dec 25, 2012)

Thank you Keep trying.  I think I finally have a mental picture.  Thanks for the help everyone


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## BrianV (Dec 25, 2012)

This is with a 35mm lens at F2, on a full-frame camera. Subject close-in, some distance with the background. The 35mm lens is a releatively short focal length, and out-of-focus circles are small. A 50mm lens would give circles about twice as big.


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## BrianV (Dec 25, 2012)

A 50mm lens, at F1.5. Again on a full-frame camera. Longer focal length, wider-aperture.


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## fjrabon (Dec 25, 2012)

you can get a pretty decent amount of background blur with a 35mm f/1.8 wide open, you just have to be very close to your subject.  

This was a shot with a 35mm f/1.8:



But I was just a couple of feet away from my dog there.  It was important that she was in profile, because had she been looking straight forward on, that close up, you would have gotten perspective distortion.  

That's really the problem with getting a nice blurred background with a 35mm, is that you have to get really close to your subject to do it, and this will cause perspective distortion.  Sometimes you can avoid it by having everything on one plane (like above) or sometimes you can use the perspective distortion to your advantage, but if you want an OOF background, and you can't put your background hundreds of feet away, you have to figure out how to deal with it one way or the other.


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## cgipson1 (Dec 25, 2012)

Check this out.. might help!

Online Depth of Field Calculator


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## cosmonaut (Dec 26, 2012)

I agree your problem is subject distance and not enough separation between the subject and background. This chart should help.
Depth of Field Table


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## bunny99123 (Dec 31, 2012)

Thank you all! I am going to seriously study this


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## KmH (Dec 31, 2012)

The shorter focal length gets, the deeper the Dof will be.

Fisheye and ultra-wide angle lenses require almost no focusing because the DoF is inherently quite deep.

Understanding Depth of Field in Photography


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## DiskoJoe (Jan 2, 2013)

You should still get that 50mm f1.7. Its more Ideal for portraits. A traditional portrait lens is a 85mm on FF. A 50mm on a crop sensor is the equivalent of 75mm. Very nice focal length for using bounced flash. You can also you a 70-200 f2.8 or a 135mm for portraits. The added focal length is very nice for portraits.


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