Depth of Field on Windy Day

[jp]

Stand upwind of the tripod if wind is causing camera movement/vibration.

[Mark Sampson]

A big umbrella, held upwind of the camera, will do a lot to reduce wind-caused vibrations in your setup. Doesn't help with subject movement, I know, but it helps. Exposure for HP5+ in sunlight should be something like 1/60@ f/16 or so, which seems reasonable enough.

[LabRat]

One practical thing to do is the stronger the breeze, the shorter the FL you use while shooting... More than that, the smaller the format...

Steve K

[Leigh]

Exposure for HP5+ in sunlight should be something like 1/60@ f/16 or so, which seems reasonable enough.

Huhhhh???

HP5+ is ASA 400, so the exposure would be nominally 1/400 @ f/16 in daylight.

- Leigh

[faberryman]

Are you steadying your tripod by hanging something heavy (like your camera bag or backpack or bag of rocks) from the center column?

[Maris Rusis]

If you use a lens in a self-cocking shutter on your camera you can make long exposures as the sum of many short exposures. For example if you need 1 second set 1/15 on your shutter and press the release 15 times. The result dramatically reduces subject motion blur at the expense of multiple superimposed sharp images; could look interesting.

[Two23]

I live in South Dakota, Northern Plains. We get wind here that blows semi-trucks off the highway! My solution? Don't fight the wind motion. I will actually slow down the shutter speed to accentuate the blur of moving grass etc. It comes out looking cooler than if it was motionless, most of the time. To keep camera from blowing around I will block the wind with my RAV4, or sometimes from inside a tent.


Kent in SD

[Bob Salomon]

Shutter speeds have nothing to do with depth of field. Depth of field is solely dependent on the aperture, the point that you focused on, the desired circle of confusion and the desired degree of magnification and the viewing distance.

The only thing that shutter speed will do is allow you to change your aperture based on the shutter speed you need. If you need a different speed then your chosen aperture requires you use a faster or slower film or you push or pull your film.

Camera movements will not change your depth of field, they will change your plain of sharp focus. That is quite different then DoF and the two work together as tilts or swings only control the sharpness in a single plane, to widen that plane of focus you stop the lens down.

[David Lobato]

Rocky Mountain National park is nice. I've done a lot of mountain photography. If a scene is good enough, it's worth a try. I observe the wind patterns, its ebbs and flows. Watch for brief moments where it's still, and be ready. Have the dark slide pulled, shutter cocked, cable release in hand. When the leaves settle down, quickly take your shot. I've waited patiently and gotten sharp photos when it seemed it wasn't possible.

Use camera movements to optimize depth of field. Only stop down far enough while getting things just in focus, which allows the shortest shutter speed possible.

Then there are the windy days where you simply appreciate being out there. Leaving the camera in your pack is okay, there will be another day to expose film.

[Jac@stafford.net]

Bring a golfing umbrella to shield the camera during exposure.