Bokeh With Point And Shoot Cameras? No Way?

Guess what everyone, Sony has a new feature called “background defocus” that internally takes 2 pictures, determines subject and background, then introduces additional blur to the background and combines the image to create an excellent bokeh effect with a point and shoot. I tested it out and it really works! This was my biggest gripe of digital photography, the small aperatures with no DOF.

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Nancy,

The reason you aren’t able to easily get the bokeh in the background of your photos, is because of a limitation with the lens. I own a Canon S5is which is the older cousin of the SX20IS. You can achieve this effect, but it is more difficult than a DSLR with say a 50mm lens and a large aperture. Your camera has a zoom lens which is trying to achieve as much flexibility as possible. It is giving you figuratively 28 – 5xx mm of capability. The depth of field (narrow in this case) is created with a large aperture, which is a small f-stop number. This capability is again limited as it needs to achieve both ends of the spectrum. Keep in mind, that with a DSLR, you would have a lens for each kind of shot you are creating. You’d have a zoom lens for longer shots, and more of a lower mm lens to achieve portrait style photos. I have “achieved” bokeh, but actually with capturing the subject from a greater distance (longer focal length). For example, I was sitting approximately 3 feet away from this ornament. If you click on image info, you can see the focal length was 72mm and my f-stop was 3.5 which is the lowest available at longer focal lengths for my camera. If I pulled the lens all the way in, say at 30mm or so, and set the f-stop to 2.7, I would not achieve this effect. To that end, I find that longer focal lengths with the lowest f-stop (largest aperture) is the way to achieve this. If someone can explain the science further as to how it relates to focal length, I’d be glad to hear it. I hope what I provided helps shed a little light on the technique with our types of camera.

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the reason is not that the aperturevalue is do big, but because the sensor is too small.

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Portraiture bokeh (like your DSLR example) is possible with a P&S. It just takes some moving around and setting up, in the way that a shot with the DSLR wouldn’t.

Nice shots, what P&S camera are you using? I’m using an Olympus P&S and the bokeh shots out of that are amazing!

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Say, I’m wondering how do you like the SX 1 . . . the bokeh shots are cool — I need to remember to think closer (I tend to take lots of photos in the mountains while hiking).

But more to the point, have you heard anything about when or if the SX1 will be available in the U.S.?

(I’m obviously waiting: <a href=”http://www.wickedcooltech.com/index.php/271/the-wicked-canon-sx1-superzoom-you-cant-have.html”

Best,
–Chris

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I hope someday camera makers will include “bokeh” in their list of scene modes apart from the usual beach, indoor, fireworks, sunset and so on… that would be nice!

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