This week’s photo tip has all to do with unlocking the use of the maximum aperture that your lens has to offer. I’m sure many of you have gone out and bought yourselves a 50mm lens with a maximum aperture of around f/1.4 or f/1.8, put it on your camera and immediately set the lens to its largest aperture and tried to take outfit photos. After all, the larger the aperture, the blurrier the backgrounds, right? Well…it probably didn’t work out nearly as well as you’d hoped it would {a.k.a. you got a whole lot of blurry photos}, and you probably asked yourself why you even spent all the money on a lens with that large of an aperture if you can’t even use it to take outfit photos. Well, you can.

The reason shooting with really large apertures is so difficult is that it involves a completely different shooting technique than you’re used to. You’re dealing with a depth of field that is razor thin so it leaves absolutely no room for error. If you screw up, your subject will be entirely out of focus. So, here’s several techniques/pieces of advice that you’ll need to learn/use to help you shoot wide open.

1. Select a single focus point. This is the most crucial. When dealing with a depth of field this small, you have to tell your camera where to focus. A camera decides where to focus by finding areas of contrast, and when you allow the camera to use all of the focus points to determine the area of proper focus, who knows what it’ll focus on. Nine times out of ten though, it probably won’t be exactly where you wanted it to be. When taking full body shots of your subject at maximum aperture, select the vertical most focal point and place it over your subject’s eye to focus. If they’re wearing sunglasses, place this focus point directly on their forehead. If you’re trying to photograph an accessory {such as a watch for example}, choose the focus point nearest to or on the accessory.

Focus on the eyes or forehead for full body shots. {Taken at f/1.2}

Choose the focus point closest to the accessory that you want to photograph to ensure that it’s in focus. {Taken at f/1.2}

2. DO NOT focus and recompose! Like I said earlier, the depth of field when dealing with apertures of f/1.2-f/2.0 is very, VERY small. Once you focus, you have to take the picture immediately. If you move the camera even the slightest bit in any direction, or change the angle that it’s facing in relation to the subject, there’s a 99.9% chance that you’re going to get a blurry, out of focus photo. I know many of you want photos where the subject isn’t in the center of the photo, but this just can’t really happen in camera. You can always crop the photo later in post-production to get the composition that you want. Focus on making sure the image is sharp first when taking the picture.

You can change the composition of the subject in post production by cropping the photo should you like.

3. Maximize your depth of field. This is a neat fact. At a constant aperture, increasing the distance between yourself and your subject will increase the depth of field. All this means is that the depth of field is greater when shooting at f/1.2 while standing 12ft. away from your subject than when shooting at f/1.2 while standing 10ft. away from your subject. If you’re shooting with a large aperture and find that a vast majority of your subject’s body is in focus, but a little bit still isn’t, try taking a few steps back. This might increase the depth of field just enough to get their whole outfit in focus.

Shooting wide open can be devastatingly frustrating to master. I’m not going to sugar coat it either and say that if you become proficient in these techniques that you’ll never get a blurry photo again because that’s just not going to happen. The truth is that you’re going to have to take more photos than you would at a smaller aperture to ensure that you get one that’s really sharp and usable. I still get plenty of blurry photos myself. That just comes with the territory when using apertures with depths of fields this small. But however, by practicing these techniques, you’ll be able to get a whole lot more really great shots that are usable. It might be a little frustrating, but it’s definitely worth it, because let me tell you, when you nail the focus on your subject with a really large aperture, the results are absolutely spectacular.