hyperfocal focusing for landscapes with 28mm?

[daniel buck]

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the sun lit stones in the first picture are already at infinity which starts at about 40m with a 28mm lens.

 

yes and I focused just a bit onfront of them, on the farthest bush you can see, near the base about 1/3rd the way from the bottom of the photo on the right hand side. Airing on the side of the far details, since the close details are in shadow. But for this shot, most everything is in very good focus, the very close foreground is just a touch soft

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[jaapv]

The best way to get sharpness in images like this is to take a series at different focus settings from a (heavy, preferably wooden) tripod, stack them in photoshop and with a series of layer masks/brush get the image sharp all over.

[daniel buck]

The best way to get sharpness in images like this is to take a series at different focus settings from a (heavy, preferably wooden) tripod, stack them in photoshop and with a series of layer masks/brush get the image sharp all over.

 

yea, that crossed my mind, and I've done it before on some extreme angles. But all of these were taken hand held. Once my light-weight tripod arrives, I may do more of this for shots that need it (particularly some of the vertical shots, where the camera sees more of the real close foreground).

[cheewai_m6]

i thought for hyper focussing, the markings on the lens tell you where to focus depending on the aperture. the markings also tell you at which point objects will be in focus, all the way to infinity.

 

i've hyperfocussed in street photography without any trouble. have i missed the point of this thread?

[daniel buck]

i thought for hyper focussing, the markings on the lens tell you where to focus depending on the aperture. the markings also tell you at which point objects will be in focus, all the way to infinity.

 

i've hyperfocussed in street photography without any trouble. have i missed the point of this thread?

 

My question was really just wondering how accurate/reliable those numbers are for a landscape shot where I want as much of the frame in good focus as possible.

[Rick in CO]

Are you talking about focusing at the hyperfocal distance when using a biogon-type wide angle lens? The theory, from the large format user perspective, is that due to the extreme curvature of lens elements found in a biogon-type wide angle lens, the entire field will only be sharply focused (or,at least as much as the lens is capable) when the lens is set at the hyperfocal distance for the selected aperture. This gets you sharpness across the selected plane of focus. This is obviously different than using a hyperfocal scale for a particular aperture to get near-far depth-of-field for acceptable sharpness. In the latter case, I would focus on the most important subject in the scene and adjust the aperture for appropriate depth of field. The classic advice for view cameras is to look at the recommended aperture and then stop down two f-stops further. Usually requires a tripod.

Hope this helps.

Rick in CO

[cheewai_m6]

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My question was really just wondering how accurate/reliable those numbers are for a landscape shot where I want as much of the frame in good focus as possible.

 

yeah, but it tells you on the markings what will be in focus and what won't. for instance on my 50mm cron (just using this lens for example because it's the one on my camear). if i'm on F8, and i turn the focus so that the infinity is on 8, then everything from about 4.5m to infinity, will be in focus. it's that simple.

[giordano]

The theory, from the large format user perspective, is that due to the extreme curvature of lens elements found in a biogon-type wide angle lens, the entire field will only be sharply focused (or,at least as much as the lens is capable) when the lens is set at the hyperfocal distance for the selected aperture. This gets you sharpness across the selected plane of focus.

 

The only way I can make sense of this is to assume that you believe that Biogon-type wide angle lenses suffer very badly from curvature of field - so badly that they can't get a flat test target sharp across the entire field at any aperture at any distance shorter than something beyond the hyperfocal distance . Do you, and do they?

[giordano]

yeah, but it tells you on the markings what will be in focus and what won't. for instance on my 50mm cron (just using this lens for example because it's the one on my camear). if i'm on F8, and i turn the focus so that the infinity is on 8, then everything from about 4.5m to infinity, will be in focus. it's that simple.

 

It's not that simple. If you use the focus scale like that, everything from about 4.5m to infinity will appear to be in focus if you are looking at a print no bigger than about 10 x 15cm from a distance of no less than about 25cm. If you want to make a bigger print that stands close scrutiny, you need to use a smaller aperture than the scale on the lens suggests - as so many people in this thread have stated.

 

This http://www.largeformatphotography.info/articles/DoFinDepth.pdf is the best detailed explanation I've ever seen. (For cognoscenti: it presents Merklinger's theory in the context of the conventional understanding of DOF and for the first time I understand what he was getting at.)