Hello Luke,
Adding to the good recommendations in the other posts, I would suggest you make a technical approach to it.
Here you have an App (free) for the smartphone I'm very happy with: DOF by Jonathan Sachs
https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...athansachs.dof
Attachment 184211
It calculates the Circle of Confusion for any object distance, focus distance and aperture. You need also to be aware of the diffraction limitation in the resolving power for each aperture:
https://kenrockwell.com/tech/diffraction.htm
Many times you won't need any calculation, any table or any App to obtain a perfectly sharp shot, but what I suggest to you is that with the tools I've pointed you try to make some technically optimal shots, knowing how much resolving power you have in any spot of the scene you are interested in. This would be in the size or the CoC or in line pairs per mm.
After you make that excercise (making some technically optimal shots) you will have the skills to nail a perfect sharpness in any situation.
The complicated thing about LF focus is not acquiring the skills I'm pointing, but
managing tilt-swing to creatively focus or defocus what you want for aesthetics, this is where true masterly relies !!!!
But first is learning to make technically optimal shots, IMHO if you take this learning way you'll gain that knowledge in two weeks and for ever.
Led me add a cheap way to practice all that:
> Locate a suitable scene to practice
> With DOF calculator and diffraction table establish a focus management solution
> Take a DSLR with a zoom, set the same focal, focus point and aperture you would use with the view camera. The DSLR won't take all the scene, but that's irrelevant
> From the point of view (with those settings) take shots pointing to different objects in the scene, you'll have partial crops of the scenes
> Analyze the result in the PC and repeat if you are not satisfied.
The DOF from the DSLR lens will be similar to the LF lens at same aperture/focal, but the DSLR has a lot of resolving power for the crop so you will see what you have done.
This is the learning way I used to understand the intrinsics of that, as I was recommended, and I think I can recommend it again.
Regards,
Pere
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