one of your most asked questions is how
do you get tack sharp images
especially when it comes to groups when
you're shooting
wide open on a prime lens in this video
i'm going to show you how
my name is pai and i'm one of the
founders of lynn and jersa photography
and slrlounge.com
we're teaming up with adorama to bring
you a new series of photography
tutorials called
master your craft right here on
adoramatv so let's dive in
what's up friends my name is pai welcome
to adoramatv
this is master your craft and today
we're talking tack sharp images when
shooting
wide open i've got five tips and steps
for you all let's go ahead and jump
straight in number one whenever you're
posing more than one person for groups
you want to make sure that everybody is
lined up perfectly
on the same plane now the easiest way to
do this
is to actually walk right to the side of
them
looking at their profiles and making
sure that you kind of move them forward
or backward just to get their faces
on the same focal plane i also like to
explain to them
what i'm doing and i'll say look guys
i'm shooting with a
wide aperture what that means is that
the depth is very
shallow if anybody is in front or behind
you're going to be blurry
they're not going to know what it means
if you just say i'm shooting with a wide
aperture so make sure you explain if
anyone's in front or behind
you're going to come out a little bit
blurry once they line up you're going to
do that final little test
and then get to it and then you're gonna
go to step
two and this is to use pixel based
focusing systems
now if you're on a mirrorless camera say
for example an eos r
a sony a7r for a whatever
any of the mirrorless systems you're
generally going to be using pixel based
focusing
already but if you're on say an older
dslr
like for example a canon 5d mark iv or
5d mark
iii you want to make sure you turn on
live view and shoot
using live view because this is when you
get pixel based focusing
which does a much better job of tracking
focus than using
through the lens focus systems when
shooting wide open
number three if you got face and eye
detection make sure
it is turned on see once the group is
all lined up you want to make sure that
that focus is placed directly over the
face
and if there are eyes even better place
it right over
the eyes number four i want you to
understand
distance and namely the further you are
back then the more leeway you have in
this
focal plane so on say for example a 50
millimeter that i have on this eos r
well if i'm standing say 10 or 15 feet
back i have a little bit more wiggle
room
in that plane of focus than i would if i
was only
five feet away from the group so the
closer you get
the more things have to be really
perfect and you have to take into
consideration
as you step closer the distance between
each person that group is gonna slightly
vary
so give yourself a little bit more
working room step back just a little
more and understand the lens that you're
working with
and this brings me to tip five which is
to really know the lens see on the rfl
50 millimeter i know that at f 1.2 i can
still
get a really sharp image out of the
camera
but that's not the case on all primes a
lot of primes they're gonna end up being
a little bit
too soft when shooting wide open so
understand the lens that you have
and know that when you're shooting wide
open the image is always
gonna be a little bit softer than when
you stop down
by two or three stops for example know
that if you're working with a lens that
tends to get out of focus towards the
edges
don't shoot a group shot wide open it's
just not a good idea
you can stop it down a bit to f2 or f
2.8 or wherever you need to go
to make sure that lens that prime is
going to give you
edge to edge sharpness with a larger
group now putting all of this into
practice i want you to take a look at
these
family portraits because all of these
were shot at f 1.2
and when you put all these steps into
play not only are they going to be sharp
at a distance
but even when stepping in a little bit
closer still shooting
wide open the images are still sharp
granted
practice with this especially when
you're talking about clients
don't try something like this your very
first time on a paid shoot
i want you guys to practice these
techniques master them
and then take it onto your paid sessions
now here are
three bonus tips do not and i repeat
do not shoot wide open when you're
shooting journalistically
see when it comes to shooting portraits
and your subject is holding still and
you're trying to aim for this kind of
stuff
it's great you can go for this artistic
super shallow depth of field but when
shooting
journalistically in the moment well
you're gonna get a lot of blurry
images so if you've got a bride and
groom walking down the aisle whatever it
is
don't shoot that wide open if you do you
better
know your gear and know that the focus
can actually keep up
i usually like to stop down a little bit
so on a 2470 i'm usually shooting at f28
when they're coming down i know that at
that point
on a lens like the 2470 that focuses
very quickly
i know that shooting wide open i can
still get tack sharp images with each
click
if you're shooting sports you're going
to want to stop down if you're shooting
anything
action you're going to want to stop down
when you've got moving subjects and
you're shooting journalistically
don't shoot a f 1.2 or wide open
number two i want you to verify
sharpness now i'm very comfortable with
this technique
and even then whenever shooting wide
open
especially with group shots i'm still
just gonna double check
each and every image to make sure that i
have good expressions and that they're
tack sharp
and if it's not i will stop down a
little if i notice that my lens is
getting a little bit
soft or miscalibrated i will stop down
right in that moment
as opposed to getting back to the studio
and realizing that half of these shots
are out of focus
bonus tip number three keep in mind that
depth is a wonderful
compositional tool but it's only one of
many compositional tools available to
you from
lighting to compositional techniques
like leading lines
framing symmetry all that kind of stuff
depth is
one of these pieces in addition to
expression and everything else
when you rely on every single image to
be shot wide open so that your
background is blurred
you're going to end up with a portfolio
of images that look
rather similar and kind of boring so use
depth it's a wonderful tool just don't
lean on it as your compositional crutch
that's it folks hope you all enjoyed
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peace