focus problem.

[tgtaylor]

Peter is right about stepping down. In practice I always focus at the widest aperture and then step down to the taking aperture. It's a good idea to look thru the GG when stepping down to make that determination rather than just stepping down to some pre-determined aperture without looking.

Thomas

[tgtaylor]

When posting earlier this morning I was thinking that maybe a slight swing would be in order if, say, 3 was further out on the row than 2 even thou the distance to the row line would be equal. But since I wasn't behind the camera I discounted that for purposes of brevity. So, maybe, and I stress maybe, a tad of swing would be more appropriate. What do you think?

Thomas

[Doremus Scudder]

You guys are just confusing the issue here.

In the scenario posited by the OP, there are no camera movements that will get all three subjects in the same plane. Depth-of-field is the only help here.

In essence, there are two planes in the scene that would both need to be in focus. Movements allow one to position one plane-of-sharp-focus, but not two. One could get two of the three people in the same plane, but never all three (unless you were shooting from directly above, in which case you could get the tops of all the heads in the same plane; I don't think that's what the OP is after here though...). So stopping down is the only available tool.

That said, the placement of the plane of sharp focus in order to take best advantage of depth-of-field is crucial. In this case, it should be parallel to the plane of the two people in the back row and halfway between the near person and the two people in the second row (hope that's clear...).

Further, to clarify "halfway"; the thing to do is focus on the far plane, note the position of the standards, then focus on the near, note the position of the standards and then split the difference by positioning the standards at the midpoint between the two distances. The amount of focus spread will determine the optimum f-stop. To find the best f-stop, you need to have tested a lot or read the following: http://www.largeformatphotography.info/fstop.html

Best of luck to the OP,

Doremus

[Tobias Key]

All you could do is stop down, or rearrange the group so swing is possible. In other words have them moving further away from left to right or have one close on the left and two further away on the right. Having one subject close and in the centre scuppers all opportunity for movements.

[tgtaylor]

Here's a somewhat similar situation:



IIRC I used front tilt and stopped down so that the cross in the foreground (1), trees in the mid-ground, and church with bell towers (2&3) were sharp throughout. This is a salt print to the actual print is not as sharp as it would had I printed it as a SG on glossy paper.

Thomas

[tgtaylor]

Here's another one:



As you can see, everything in this image is sharp from the foredeck and mast in the foreground, the rigging along the port and starboard sides, to the rear deck entryway along with the rear deck. Again, tilt and stopping down worked.

Thomas

[Heroique]

...rearrange the group...

I'd ask the front person to take a couple steps back.

Or the two back people to take a couple steps forward.

As you give these instructions, say you want to make sure everyone looks handsome.

[Doremus Scudder]

Thomas,

Nice photographs! I especially like the square-rigger.

As to your use of tilt for such subjects: Yes! A lot of people would just stop down in such a situation, but given that there is a lot of foreground in front of the mast that you want to keep sharp, a small amount of tilt places the plane-of-sharp-focus in an optimum position to get the most out of depth-of-field.

I don't think this was the OPs situation, but it points out a very important aspect of using camera movements; that of getting the plane-of-sharp-focus at a minimum distance from all the elements in a scene that you want to render sharply. The check for me is always focus spread. I tilt or swing to place the plane-of-sharp-focus at what I believe to be the optimum location (by choosing focus points in the scene to focus on) and then check by using focus spread. The amount of movement that gives the least focus spread between "near" and "far" elements in a scene is always the best.

Again, great prints!

Doremus

[tgtaylor]

Thanks Doremus .

When I first got into LF, setting-up a plane of focus was confusing for me. For me 3 points determine a plane and I don't believe that the author of the LF intro book that I bought by Stone or Stewart differentiated between base and center tilt cameras. I remember trying the hyerfocal method that I used so successfully with a Pentax MF camera but it didn't pan out for that shot and haven't tried it since with LF. Nowadays focusing on the near and far and stopping down for everything else has been the answer for me so far.

Thomas