Canon Powershot A85 - Problem getting narrow range of field

[thoward1981]

To all:

New to the forum here. I've been doing some reading and am trying to get familiar with using the manual settings on my Powershot A85. I've been trying to work with focusing on a close object using a lower f stop in order to focus on the close object, but make the objects in the background seem blurry. (I believe this is making use of a "narrow range of field").

I've tried this a number of ways, but the objects in the background always seem to be relatively well in focus. Am i missing a step in the process or is this not possible without the use of a SLR type camera?

Any input from the "experts" here?

Thanks

Tim

[SkipD]

It's very difficult to get a shallow depth of field with a very small film frame or sensor size and a short focal length lens, both of which your camera (and most other point-n-shoot cameras) has. That's a good thing for most users of point-n-shoot cameras, of course, but it gets in the way of folks who are trying to be creative with them.

[suecassidy]

Some point and shoots have a digital macro setting in manual mode. My Canon does. Depending on what you are shooting of course, you have to be close up, but it does allow the camera to focus very closely, so naturally every else goes blurry. I could take a photo of a flower and get background blur, but I couldn't take a pic of a car and expect to get the background blurry. That is just the nature of the smaller sensor size.