Aperture

[magpieant]

Howdy,

I was always under the impression that with landscape photography, a smaller aperture (e.g. f/22) was a good thing as it meant sharper pictures.

However, I have just read in a photography mag that f/16 is better than f/22 - although it does not state why.

Can anyone enlighten me?

Cheers.

Anth.

 

[King_Boru]

The lens sharpness degrades from roughly f/16 onward. Really, f/11 is the optimal sharpness of most lenses.

f/22 is perfectly fine, its just not as sharp as f/16, but really not that noticeable to the eye, only if you pixel peep.

King.

 

[CT]

Yep - f11 is probably about the optimum although it can vary from lens to lens. Whar happens is that as you stop down to a smaller aperture, the light is being 'squeezed' through a smaller aperture and some of it bounces off the edges of the diaphragm blades, gets deflected, and then bounces around inside the lens off the elements causing deterioration of image quality. The effect is known as diffraction.

 

[magpieant]

Nice one - thank you very much - a great descripton of what happens there!

Thanks for the info.

Anth.

 

[Marcel]

CT, he's our font of knowledge.