Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/12/27

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Subject: Re: [Leica] DoF, was: Noctilux-M v. Summilux-R
From: Jerry Lehrer <jerryleh@pacbell.net>
Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2003 16:13:49 -0800
References: <20031227201539.78162.qmail@web40909.mail.yahoo.com> <000f01c3ccc9$777428e0$87d86c18@gv.shawcable.net>

Ted

Frankly I agree with you completely, however if I were to address
LUGers that way, they would really get pissed off at me.

Jerry

Ted Grant wrote:

> Lee offered:
> Subject: Re: [Leica] DoF, was: Noctilux-M v. Summilux-R
>
> > One interesting thing occurred to me is the "reversed"
> > thinking of DoF.  Instead of a set of parameters like
> > a given lens, aperture and distance (and then to
> > figure out the DoF), it seems to me that DoF and the
> > "size" of image commands the aperture to use for a
> > given lens. <<<<<
>
> Aw geeesh Lee com'n, photography is bad enough to learn all the bits and
> pieces without adding some techie thing to confuse people.  Hell what's
> wrong with just pointing the camera at the subject at f8 and be there? :-) I
> mean that's worked for a zillion years, why mess with people's minds at this
> late date?
>
> > Probably portraits are the most popular
> > and sensitive case for DoF usage.  In this case, for
> > regular adult portraits of head and shoulder shots, we
> > typically want to have a DoF about 4" for facial
> > contour before taking a picture.  Therefore, you may
> > roughly use 50 focal lens at aperture of 2 or 85 at
> > aperture of 4 (to get comparable image size at
> > whatever distance needed).<<<,
>
> Holy jumpin' did you drink too much over the holiday? Heck most portrait
> shooters already know this kind of stuff and amateurs wouldn't have a clue
> what yer talking about without a bunch more diagrams to follow. Even then
> they'd not likely understand what the hell yer talkin' about..
>
> > I don't see a such "DoF" calculator (it should be
> > called "aperture calculator" for given DoF - modern
> > camera can have this built-in (little different from
> > canon's DoF priority)).  To me this is more useful. In
> > most cases, people know ahead what DoF they want and
> > the image size (which determines the distance and is
> > part of composition).  What they don't know is what
> > aperture to use.  btw, the marking on lens is hard to
> > use for such large aperture.
> >
> > [To make it topic-related, in order to use Noct's max
> > aperture with DoF of 4", you may have to be roughly 6'
> > away.]<<<
>
> Holy Cow!!!! Man I never worry about the Noctilux and depth of field because
> I'm concentrating on the light and subject and certainly I'm way too busy
> shooting pictures. The only time I think of making changes is when I want to
> kill a distracting background then I pop it wide open and it becomes a
> "clean" background.
>
> Most cases I'm nearly wide open to start off with, a stop or bit down
> because what's the point of paying the big bucks for a Noctilux f1.0 and
> then start stopping down with it? Quite frankly that's rather stupid!
>
> ted
>
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In reply to: Message from Lee <leeh0@yahoo.com> (Re: [Leica] DoF, was: Noctilux-M v. Summilux-R)
Message from Ted Grant <tedgrant@shaw.ca> (Re: [Leica] DoF, was: Noctilux-M v. Summilux-R)