Depth of field and focal plane

[alex best]

I have been reading A User's Guide To The View Camera by Jim Stone, which seems very detailed, informative and well written. So far I have grasped the operation and set-up of the camera but am still struggling with depth of field as it relates to movements of the front and rear standards. HERE (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v228/robertpollard/images342.jpg) is a link to a large photo I really love and wonder how it was done. I especially like the front to back sharp focus and pose, and wonder if this was done at a smaller aperture to achieve the effect, or if movements were also needed. Another example is THIS (http://www.flickr.com/photos/deardorff81/4458296943/in/faves-randomalex/) photo that I also like that has a different and much shorter depth of field. Is this done without movements and a wide aperture alone? Thanks for any insight.

Alex

[Darin Boville]

Funny, I was just showing my kids how this worked on my new camera. Notice that in the photo the tree on the right is blurry. That's odd considering it is no so far away. An additional clue is that the distant mountains on the right are blurry while those on the left are sharp--they are the same distance from the camera.

So it looks like movements were used. But which ones? The common front tilt doesn't seem right since that would make things in focus from near to far. In your shot it appears the focus plane runs from near-right to far-left, sort of diagonally through the picture depth.

Hmmmm :) (Always best to reason these things our on your own...)

--Darin

[ic-racer]

Do you have a veiw camera yet? A lot of those things are more quickly learned by 'doing' than memorizing.

The focal plane orientation for the golfers was obtained by swinging the lensboard counterclockwise when looking at it from above. (or swinging the rear the opposite way).

The film plane, lens plane and line of the golfers all met in a single line as per the Scheimpflug principle, but its easiest to just swing until you get the effect you want on the ground glass.

In the golfer picture Dof is pretty shallow even in the sun with fill lighting, so I'm guessing its a print from an 8x10 negative.

In that second link they were trying that selective focus thing by tilting the lens up.

[Walter Calahan]

Clearly by swinging the front standard of the camera the photographer got all the golfers sharp, but the photographer still didn't have the young ladies place their golfballs in the correct location. HA!

The other image simply has shallow depth of field do to a wide aperture.

Best to set up your camera and move the standards around to see what their movement changes the image.

[Preston]

Alex,

There is a nice book The View Camera: Operations and Techniques by Harvey Shaman. Amphoto. Garden City, New York. ISBN: 0-8174-0598-4. August 1977.

The book covers all aspects of view camera operation. It has many illustrations that show the relation between the subject and the camera's configuration to achieve specific results.

I used this book when I first started using a view camera, and, using my own still life setup, followed along. The effort was well worth it.

I don't know if the book is still available, but a Gooogle search may turn up something.

--P

[Lon Overacker]

Alex,

IMHO, the first is a clear and classic example of swing. This could have quite possibly be even shot with a very wide aperture. I think the far trees on the right are a considerable distance further than the trees on the left. Then again, I'm not there to measure... :-)

the second image is simply a wide open image, shallow depth of field as others have mentioned.

Movements and aperture play key roles in your desired effect and these are good examples.

Man, I don't care if those golf balls are misplaced, those golfers are hot! :-)

Lon

[Lon Overacker]

Oh, forgot to mention... this is clearly a digital mock-up. There's a big sensor dust bunny in the sky the photographer failed to clean up in post processing. :-)

[Darin Boville]

Oh, forgot to mention... this is clearly a digital mock-up. There's a big sensor dust bunny in the sky the photographer failed to clean up in post processing. :-)

You know the more i look at it the odder it looks. The far golfers have blurry feet but preternaturally sharp heads...hmmmmm.

--Darin

[Leonard Evens]

...

The focal plane orientation for the golfers was obtained by swinging the lensboard counterclockwise when looking at it from above. (or swinging the rear the opposite way).

The film plane, lens plane and line of the golfers all met in a single line as per the Scheimpflug principle, but its easiest to just swing until you get the effect you want on the ground glass.
....

.

Hmmm

The subject plane seems to me to be intersecting the image plane to the right of the lens. According to the Scheimpflug Principle, the lens plane must have been swung so that it too intersected those planes in the same line. Unless I have my directions all screwed up, that seems to say the lens plane was swung clockwise when looked at from above, or, as you say the rear standard was swung in the opposite direction.

[alex best]

Funny, I was just showing my kids how this worked on my new camera. Notice that in the photo the tree on the right is blurry. That's odd considering it is no so far away. An additional clue is that the distant mountains on the right are blurry while those on the left are sharp--they are the same distance from the camera.

So it looks like movements were used. But which ones? The common front tilt doesn't seem right since that would make things in focus from near to far. In your shot it appears the focus plane runs from near-right to far-left, sort of diagonally through the picture depth.

Hmmmm :) (Always best to reason these things our on your own...)

--Darin

Thanks Darin!


Do you have a veiw camera yet? A lot of those things are more quickly learned by 'doing' than memorizing.

The focal plane orientation for the golfers was obtained by swinging the lensboard counterclockwise when looking at it from above. (or swinging the rear the opposite way).

The film plane, lens plane and line of the golfers all met in a single line as per the Scheimpflug principle, but its easiest to just swing until you get the effect you want on the ground glass.

In the golfer picture Dof is pretty shallow even in the sun with fill lighting, so I'm guessing its a print from an 8x10 negative.

In that second link they were trying that selective focus thing by tilting the lens up.

Thanks ic, I am still in the planning process to buy my first LF camera and while some of this is quite obvious to someone with a little experience, it is not so for me.


Clearly by swinging the front standard of the camera the photographer got all the golfers sharp, but the photographer still didn't have the young ladies place their golfballs in the correct location. HA!

The other image simply has shallow depth of field do to a wide aperture.

Best to set up your camera and move the standards around to see what their movement changes the image.


Alex,

There is a nice book The View Camera: Operations and Techniques by Harvey Shaman. Amphoto. Garden City, New York. ISBN: 0-8174-0598-4. August 1977.

The book covers all aspects of view camera operation. It has many illustrations that show the relation between the subject and the camera's configuration to achieve specific results.

I used this book when I first started using a view camera, and, using my own still life setup, followed along. The effort was well worth it.

I don't know if the book is still available, but a Gooogle search may turn up something.

--P

Just ordered the book off Amazon, thanks for the tip!


Alex,

IMHO, the first is a clear and classic example of swing. This could have quite possibly be even shot with a very wide aperture. I think the far trees on the right are a considerable distance further than the trees on the left. Then again, I'm not there to measure... :-)

the second image is simply a wide open image, shallow depth of field as others have mentioned.

Movements and aperture play key roles in your desired effect and these are good examples.

Man, I don't care if those golf balls are misplaced, those golfers are hot! :-)

Lon

Ya the girl in the front is especially hot, and I like this picture so much it is now my desktop image lol!


Oh, forgot to mention... this is clearly a digital mock-up. There's a big sensor dust bunny in the sky the photographer failed to clean up in post processing. :-)


You know the more i look at it the odder it looks. The far golfers have blurry feet but preternaturally sharp heads...hmmmmm.

--Darin


Hmmm

The subject plane seems to me to be intersecting the image plane to the right of the lens. According to the Scheimpflug Principle, the lens plane must have been swung so that it too intersected those planes in the same line. Unless I have my directions all screwed up, that seems to say the lens plane was swung clockwise when looked at from above, or, as you say the rear standard was swung in the opposite direction.

Hmmmm...

[dasBlute]

lots of people can chime in; for focus, always swing the front
towards the plane of interest, i.e. if you're looking down
at a creek and want the water in focus tilt the front forward,
doesn't take a lot; here, swing the front towards the line of golfers...

[zx9]

Girls 6 and 8 (counting from the camera) moved their heads during the exposure, I would go for swing front on a tripod mounted LF camera.

[al olson]

Girls 6 and 8 (counting from the camera) moved their heads during the exposure, I would go for swing front on a tripod mounted LF camera.

I count to ladies 7 and 9 where the head movement occurs. Hmmmm...

I would also add that in addition to the swing (note that the building behind the girls is sharp as is the cabin on the ridge whereas the foreground grass gets blurry near each edge), it appears that a wide angle lens was also used, say 180 or 210 on 8x10 or a 90 on 4x5, which would give additional depth of field.

I would guess that these are models for a fashion shot of sports apparel, since each grouping is wearing identical sweaters and skirts. A lovely image nevertheless.

[zx9]

I count to ladies 7 and 9 where the head movement occurs. Hmmmm...



Sorry I was viewing the left side of the large image and missed counting the first girl!
The WA lens works for me too, given the great difference in apparent height down the line.

[ic-racer]

I think the camera movements are pretty standard, but what I don't know is the lighting. I'm a nearly 100% available light shooter, so I can't figure it out based on my experience. I'm very fascinated by the vintage look to the fill lighting.

Any thoughts? Battery of flashes?, Reflectors? Other??

[jp]

I would have to guess there at least two extra light sources that are pretty diffuse (such as light boxes, big umbrellas or big reflectors. The added light sources are probably at ground level as they are not casting shadows downwards like the sun. On the first girl, you can see a slight shadow cast from her left glove onto her right wrist. There also a soft shadow cast by her right arm onto the lower part of the sweater. The second girl casts a slight shadow onto shoulder of the third girl. The motion blur on the third girl's right leg and skirt indicates the use of a flash. The long exposure would have blurred the leg motion, but it was also frozen by the bright flash. You also see two different light sources in the first girl's eye.



I doubt it's a digital image, as it has a big piece of lint in the scan and a big scratch over the first girl's skirt and send girl's leg.

[Brian Ellis]

You can't really judge sharpness of a photograph on a computer monitor so it's hard to figure out what's blurred and what isn't in the original print. FWIW (not much) my guess is the photographer used a little front swing clockwise. I wouldn't think back swing because of the distortion that can create.

To me it's more fun to try to figure out the reason for making the photograph and when it was made. It doesn't look to me like a professional model/clothing photograph because of the different tops they're wearing. I first thought it might be members of a womens golf association or possibly the women playing in a golf tournament but I've played a lot of golf and I've never seen this many good looking women on a golf course at the same time. It's also interesting that four of the women are wearing identical tops that are different from all the others and they're grouped together but they haven't been placed at the front of the photograph, which tends to rule out a fashion shot. Then again, there's those identical skirts. So I don't know, anyone else have any ideas?

As for time, based on the club head designs that can be made out, I'd guess 1950s. But then some of the club shafts appear to be steel and some graphite. Graphite irons didn't start appearing until the 1970s IIRC. So I don't know about that either.

[Mike Anderson]

To me it's more fun to try to figure out the reason for making the photograph and when it was made. It doesn't look to me like a professional model/clothing photograph because of the different tops they're wearing...

I know as little about golf as I do about women's attire.

I've no answers just clues:
- The first 4 (from left) have the same outfit.
- the 2nd 4 have the same outfit.
- could be 2 more groups of 4 each with same outfit.
So I'm assuming 4 groups of 4.
- they all have ribbons in their hair with bows.
- they all have the same shoes - are those golf shoes?
- they all have fluffy bracelet things that match their skirts - was this ever common women's golfing attire?

...Mike

[Brian Ellis]

I know as little about golf as I do about women's attire.

I've no answers just clues:
- The first 4 (from left) have the same outfit.
- the 2nd 4 have the same outfit.
- could be 2 more groups of 4 each with same outfit.
So I'm assuming 4 groups of 4.
- they all have ribbons in their hair with bows.
- they all have the same shoes - are those golf shoes?
- they all have fluffy bracelet things that match their skirts - was this ever common women's golfing attire?

...Mike

Looks like you and I are the only ones more interested in the women than the fstops and movements Mike. : - )

Good point about the tops, I hadn't noticed that. I can't tell for sure whether the shoes are golf shoes or not. The fluffy bracelet things were never common to my knowledge in golf attire. Also, I just noticed that the second woman from the right has an unusable grip with her right hand way too far under the shaft so she probably isn't a golfer. I guess it's looking more and more like a fashion shot, contrary to my original thought.

[ic-racer]

Based on the lighting technique and that it is LF B&W my first thought was 50s but I was under the impression the miniskirts were not around until the late 60s. I'm guessing 66 to 72 or so. College yearbook shot of the women's golf team? In the 70s most yearbooks were still done in B&W, whereas most commercial imagery was color.

[Brian Ellis]

Based on the lighting technique and that it is LF B&W my first thought was 50s but I was under the impression the miniskirts were not around until the late 60s. I'm guessing 66 to 72 or so. College yearbook shot of the women's golf team? In the 70s most yearbooks were still done in B&W, whereas most commercial imagery was color.

I don't think it's a golf team, too many players for one team. A group of teams maybe but it would be very unusual to see such uniformly good looking women on several golf teams all at the same place and time. I'm thinking more and more that it was a fashion shot of some kind. But the dates sound about right.

[rguinter]

The haircuts suggest the 1950s. Would be difficult to find that many attractive young women from the mid 60s on wearing their hair like that. Bob G.

[sultanofcognac]

To me, the gloves and wristbands are the only thing that is exact on all models. They have many different shoe types and there are sets of like sweaters and skirts. In my opinion, neither the clubs nor hairstyles can date a photograph. Short skirts for sports were around in the 50s, but also in 2010.

We, as photographers, capture images that express what we see or feel or want others to believe. Trying to date this photo without more information is probably exactly what the photographer wants (and rightly so).

How about that 'stand' out to the left? Were those common on golf courses in the 50s/60s?

The one thing that dates this image for me is the girls' knees. How many pairs of knobby knees can one find today on both sports women and models? Rather difficult, I'd say. The girls are nice enough but posture is reminiscent of the 50/60 time frame.
Especially on the sparkly-eyed front liner. Hairdos are the easiest to 'fake'.

Someone told #1 how to hold the club and to stand - the second and third have clubs that seem to be too short.

The photographer doesn't seem to have his/her schtuff in one bag, as the posing literally sux, with #4 (with only one leg) peeking around #3, #11 positively bent in half and #12 almost not visible. If one is to take the time to set this up then I'd assume the photog would have ensured the lineup works with all models visible… #s 1 and 2 are too close to the fill light (oh, I could go on).

I think this wasn't the money shot and someone just posted a non-salable version.

But it is certainly pleasing to look at, and look at how much chatter it generated :cool:

Wish that were one of MY shots - as I'd definitely have a few phone numbers :rolleyes:

[Lon Overacker]

But it is certainly pleasing to look at, and look at how much chatter it generated :cool:

I don't know why, but somehow this image has been intriguing enough to progress from large format techniques to dating the image.... even got me wasting a few extra minutes to gather some additional clues.

Brian may be on to something about the early 70's. Two clues. I did an image search with "tineye.com" and it found this image used 1 other time. See here (http://img-thumb.ffffound.com/static-data/assets/6/16af3be09ed1a9f28ec601288fc0239cbb67b46b_s.jpg). It's a very tiny thumbnail and you can't read the bi-line in red below, but the sayings reflect the times of Helen Ready's song "I am Woman" introduced in '72 or '73. Of course that does NOT mean the image was shot in 1972-72, only that the image was potentially used then.

Second clue are the clubs themselves. Several of the clubs have black shafts which tell me graphite. I don't think they painted steel shafts black and I doubt wood was still being used. Graphite shafts were first introduced in 1973.

Having said that, I still can't get over the "look" of the girls, their faces and hair styles. this just speaks 50's to me. The hair style of the early 70's was usually long. Check your old yearbooks. Girls did not wear their hair short or up with head bands, barrettes, etc.

I don't see any "stands," but on the left it looks more like a building. Perhaps a dorm or something as this may be on or near a college campus? Also looks like California to me with the hills and oaks in the background.

If the OP Alex is still reading this, perhaps it would be helpful to know how he found this and the context it was being used. I don't think this was setup for a "team" photo of any sort. I think it may have actually been set up to show exactly what Alex's research found, Large format "swing" technique.

Oh, and clearly some reflectors or fill flash of some sort was used. the first three girls show quite a bit of light on their faces considering the sun is high and behind them. The "fill" light quickly fades after the first 3.

What does this all mean? Absolutely squat.

Lon

[ic-racer]

From those who's golf club grip can be viewed in detail, the grip seems to be appropriate. This seems to favor that being a photograph of golfers, instead of models.

[alex best]

LINK (http://www.elbrendel.com/2009/06/large-format-service-with-smile.html) to info on the photo. Sorry I was on holiday for the weekend.

[Darin Boville]

LINK (http://www.elbrendel.com/2009/06/large-format-service-with-smile.html) to info on the photo. Sorry I was on holiday for the weekend.

Outstanding. Very cool resolution of the mystery. Here is part 2 of the short on YouTube--stars off with the golf routine.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EQXhGUHooU&feature=related


At 1:07 we get our favorite scene (see clip).

-Darin

[Lon Overacker]

Thanks for settling all the speculation Alex. Just speaking for myself, just goes to show what I know....

Thanks for the video links Darin! that is classic stuff. I love the old films, shorts, etc. Who'd a thunk we could get this kind of entertainment value on a LF techniques thread?

Lon

[Mike Anderson]

1934! My guess was late '50s early '60s. Way off. Fun little exercise though.

...Mike

[Robert Hughes]

1934! My guess was late '50s early '60s. Way off. Fun little exercise though.

...Mike
I figured mid 1930's from the hairdos.

[Brian Ellis]

At least I figured they weren't golfers. But my time was a little off - just 40 years or so. : - ) The shafts that I thought were graphite must have been early steel shafts painted to look like wood, which they did for some years after steel shafts were first introduced.

[Scott Walker]

So is the date 1934?
My guess is 1930 or so for the following reasons
#1 the golf balls were the bumpy Haskell style that went out in the early 30s when the dimpled ball took over
#2 steel shafts were messed with since the late 1800s but were not legal until 1925 by the USGA so the picture is almost surely post 1925
#3 in about 1920 grips went from sued to polished leather and the clubs seem to be about half & half