Focusing on the eyes

A lot of my recent photos have been live music photography, albeit, most of them really haven't come out the way I wanted it to come out

I have been told constantly to 'focus on the eyes', I was wondering how this was possible without getting the rest of the photo all blurry?

Stop down to increase DOF?

SOK wrote in post #10189370
Stop down to increase DOF?

Don't quite get you, are you asking me a question?

I think what SOK is saying is change your Aperture to something that INCREASES the DOF of your shot. e.g., If you're shooting at 1.8 - and depending on your Focal length & distance from your subject, it's possible that things won't be in focus as wide as you want them. But that's all about DOF, not "blurry" which is what you initially posted. If you're truly talking about "blurry" pictures, there are many things that could be contributing to that problem : camera shake, too slow SS, etc.

You might want to post a pic for everyone to see the issue - and the exif data that goes with it.

Cody21 wrote in post #10190146
I think what SOK is saying is change your Aperture to something that INCREASES the DOF of your shot. e.g., If you're shooting at 1.8 - and depending on your Focal length & distance from your subject, it's possible that things won't be in focus as wide as you want them. But that's all about DOF, not "blurry" which is what you initially posted. If you're truly talking about "blurry" pictures, there are many things that could be contributing to that problem : camera shake, too slow SS, etc.

You might want to post a pic for everyone to see the issue - and the exif data that goes with it.

OK, but the other point is, that the subject in question, mainly musicians...according to the critique (not for a magazine..just on a personal level) said that they were 'too central'

Please post an example of a photo for which others have commented about focussing on the eyes. Without that, it's all guess work.

I wish I could upload a file via my crummy t-mob internet, but as usual, I would have to go to an internet cafe, so if you can have some patience, I wouldn't mind

I know you want to see an example, but as just explained, you have to blame t-mob for that

400dabuser wrote in post #10190359
OK, but the other point is, that the subject in question, mainly musicians...according to the critique (not for a magazine..just on a personal level) said that they were 'too central'

In this case, use one of the side AF points for the main subject instead of always using the center point.

400dabuser wrote in post #10190359
.according to the critique (not for a magazine..just on a personal level) said that they were 'too central'

< > (rotate the charectars the the left 90 degrees clock wise) there in-lies your sollution

Are you shooting in aperture/shutter/manua​l priority mode?
How do you achieve focus?

If you can't get enough light and external lighting (via flash) is inappropriate, you will need a lens with a larger aperture (f/1.4-2.8). However, you could also bump up the ISO but that depends on your camera.

The problem with shooting wide open is DoF. Not much else will be in focus if you are close to the subject. You could shoot with a longer lens, with a monopod to help stabalise it to remove movement blur. A longer lens also compresses the background.

It comes down to technique and gear. The way you have worded your question is ambiguous however. Are you saying that apart from the subject, everything else is blurry as in out of focus. Or that everything, including the subject, is suffering from movement blurring (also out of focus). Haha .. I'm not sure if I made it any clearer. Oops.

dche5390 wrote in post #10192263
Are you shooting in aperture/shutter/manua​l priority mode?
How do you achieve focus?

If you can't get enough light and external lighting (via flash) is inappropriate, you will need a lens with a larger aperture (f/1.4-2.8). However, you could also bump up the ISO but that depends on your camera.

The problem with shooting wide open is DoF. Not much else will be in focus if you are close to the subject. You could shoot with a longer lens, with a monopod to help stabalise it to remove movement blur. A longer lens also compresses the background.

It comes down to technique and gear. The way you have worded your question is ambiguous however. Are you saying that apart from the subject, everything else is blurry as in out of focus. Or that everything, including the subject, is suffering from movement blurring (also out of focus). Haha .. I'm not sure if I made it any clearer. Oops.

I shoot mainly in shutter priority mode

The subject's face is in focus when focusing on the eyes, but everything else is mainly out of focus

Bryan Peterson's "Understanding Exposure" is a good book that explains some of the basic concepts of photography, including how aperture affects DOF.

Shutter priority will use whatever aperture that is required to maintain the shutter speed. This will probably necessitate the use of f1.8 which gives a razor thin DOF. Stopping up to f2.8 or f4 will increasse the DOF by quite a way

DOF at f1.8 @10ft=0.81ft
DOF at f2.8 @10ft=1.29ft
DOF at F4 @10ft=1.84ft

Bear in mind that only the subject at exactly the focal length will be at perfect focus - everything else is levels of acceptable sharpness as described here

However the depth of "acceptable sharpness" will increase with the increase of DOF.

Also to be borne in mind is the viewing distance and method- if you are viewing at 100% or greater, the circle of confusion will be far tighter than is viewed at billboard size!

egordon99 wrote in post #10194759
Bryan Peterson's "Understanding Exposure" is a good book that explains some of the basic concepts of photography, including how aperture affects DOF.

+1

I think every noobie should have this book in their personal library.

egordon99 wrote in post #10194759
Bryan Peterson's "Understanding Exposure" is a good book that explains some of the basic concepts of photography, including how aperture affects DOF.

Cody21 wrote in post #10197833
+1

I think every noobie should have this book in their personal library.

But he doesn't do live music photography