Practicing DoF with a 300mm lens during our photography lesson in St Petersburg Florida
On a warm February Saturday morning I met Patricia with her new Nikon D7000 in downtown St. Petersburg for our first of four 1-on-1 DSLR Photography Lessons. She was very new to DSLR cameras, and photography in general, but my 5-step process for learning how to make a well exposed and sharp photograph works for total beginners as well as more experienced photographers. We began the lesson with a lengthy tour of how to use her Nikon and in particular how to use the finger and thumb dials to make adjustments to the critical aperture and shutter speed settings.
In the second half of the lesson we wondered around the waterfront area practicing how to control DoF, in particular, how to make the background disappear into a nice, creamy bokeh. This skill is very useful for portraits especially, as well as just adding a creative look to an image overall. Using the paperboy statue out in front of the St. Petersburg Museum of History I showed Patricia how focal length and distance from the subject matters even more than using a large aperture in creating bokeh.
For our next lesson we will head out to The Pier!
