What to focus on with Portraits

  • Thread starter Thread starter RobbieW
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RobbieW

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Hi

Normally when I take a photo of a person I always focus on the persons eyes using the centre focus point and then recompose. I was told this is a good was of ensuring the eyes are therefore the rest of the face is sharp.

I am doing some portrait shots tomorrow with 2 people, what should I focus on in this scenario?

Thanks

Rob
 
Rob, that's sort of one of those questions with no solid answer.

If your goal is to have the whole face sharp, your first consider should be your aperture. If you're shooting at close range with an aperture of 1.8, the subjects eyes can be tack sharp and the ears can be very out of focus. Or you can end up with one eye sharp and one eye not.

I would say that in general, you will want to focus on the eye nearest to you. That way, even if the DOF is too shallow for everything to be in focus, you will still get a pleasing image.

That said, the eyes are not always the focus of a portrait. Only you can decide what you want to emphasize.

You may also consider focusing manually when photographing people, particularly if they're not sitting still and posing for you. I find that when shooting candid-style portraits, there's no time to focus and recompose. Focusing manually means 1) you will definitely know what you've focused on, and 2) you don't miss shots due to the slight time delay caused by the focus/recompose. That's particularly true when working with young children, or when working in low light.

- CJ
 
It's really going to depend on how the two people are sitting/posed. If they're both face on side by side then I'd use a focus point on the upper left or right to lock on the eye of one person. With other poses/positions maybe try manual and focus through the range and see what looks best in the viewfinder?

If you're going to have one in focus and the other out then I'd agree with CJ and keep the closest to camera in focus.
 
rwotton said:
Thanks Kev, any pointers that you can remember from it, not sure if I can get one in time and digest the info.
Click to expand...

Got to confess that I have not had a chance to read it through yet matey.

It did look good though ... :D ... And they used two great looking models.

:exit:
 
hypnotic said:
Got to confess that I have not had a chance to read it through yet matey.

It did look good though ... :D ... And they used two great looking models.

:exit:
Click to expand...

thats ok, thank goodness for 24hr shopping :woot:
 
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