Depth of Field

Depth of Field is a key element of photography that is important to understand to be able to capture a successful image, with the subject in focus what ever the focal length is. It is a complex thing to understand in my own experience, especially when using film cameras such as the 5x4 that we are using for this assignment. After a few explanations from Tim and research online, depth of field is finally making more sense to me. It refers to how much is clear in the background and what is in foes.  A large depth of field means the the focused area would be a lot greater for example with this assignment, the person who's portrait you want to capture would include the person in focus but also the background behind them. This can be achieved by using smaller apertures and higher f-stops. A shallow depth of field means it has less of a focused area, which would be focused on just the person in the portrait photograph, using a larger aperture and smaller f-stop would produce this in the image.