What setting?

[Welshy74]

Was out with my wife and daughter today at Cardiff Castle. Was taking shots of the both of them using Aperture mode, af-s, single point focus. Now the issue I had was if I focused on my wifes face my daughters face would be out of focus and vice versa and the only other focus option was af-a but i thought then its guess work to what it would focus on. Your advice would be much appreciated

 

[480sparky]

Will need to know the following:

ISO used, shutter speed & aperture of the image, and what focal length the lens was set at.

 

[mikew_RIP]

My first thought is if your focus was correct on one what aperture where you using on what lens,sounds a bit as if it could be lack of DOF.

 

[mikew_RIP]

Bugger must type quicker

 

[Welshy74]

ISO was 100,Shutter speed was 250, 1.8 aperture on my 35mm f1.8

 

[480sparky]

Raise the ISO up to 400. That will close the aperture down to f/4. You can also get a smaller aperture yet by slowing the shutter down to 1/125 (f/5.6) or even 1/60 (for f/8). That should vastly increase your DOF.

 

[Welshy74]

So is it because the aperture was to wide giving the shallow DOF and was potentially blurring my daughter out?

 

[Moab Man]

Aperture of 1.8 is used to have only one point in focus and everything else as blurred as possible. It's a very simplistic way to explain it, but that's what was happening.

 

[Welshy74]

So single point focus is ok but have a lower aperture?

 

[480sparky]

So is it because the aperture was to wide giving the shallow DOF and was potentially blurring my daughter out?

Yep. A 35mm lens at f/1.8 has only about 2½ feet of DOF when focused at 10 feet. Close it down to f/8, and you've got almost 8.

 

[480sparky]

So single point focus is ok but have a lower aperture?

Smaller, yes.... higher number.

 

[Welshy74]

Yep. A 35mm lens at f/1.8 has only about 2½ feet of DOF when focused at 10 feet. Close it down to f/8, and you've got almost 8.

Thank you. I will give it a try

 

[480sparky]

Thank you. I will give it a try 

You may also try focusing in between the two subjects manually. That will maximize your DOF.