Vernon Chalmers Photography: Canon EOS 700D

01 April 2016

Canon EOS 700D - Depth of Field Lens Test

With Canon EOS 700D / Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II prime lens

With EF 50mm f1.8 II lens at f1/8 ISO 400 (cropped)

Depth of Field test with Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II / Canon EF-S 18-135mm IS USM lenses.

With Canon EOS 700D / Rebel T5i DSLR (Av Mode) tested with Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II lens (nifty fifty) and Canon EF-S 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM lens. (Photos: Vernon Chalmers Milnerton Cape Town)

Objective: Demonstrating the changes in Depth of Field for creating selected background blur with variable aperture settings using two different Canon lenses. Depth of field is also referred to as Bokeh - which in Japanese means to blur / quality of blur by deliberately selecting certain area(s) of a photo in and out of focus.

Depth Of Field (DOF)
To go from a deeper to shallower DOF with any camera / lens combination one of the main considerations is Aperture (the size of the space in which light enters the lens / camera. It is measured in f/stops - a fractional formula used for allowing a certain amount of light in - ie. f/5.6 or f/11 which is controlled by the photographer via a variety of ways ie. manually dialing it in Av or Manual mode on the camera body). In Auto or P mode (and Tv Mode) the camera will decide the aperture for you).

Note: Using the same subject (London Red Telephone Money Box) at the same 50mm focal lengths for both lenses. With the Canon EF 18-135mm IS STM lens apertures f/3.5-f/4 is not available at this particular focal length. The Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM kit lens provided more / less the same Depth of Field results as the EF-S 18-135mm lens (at 50mm focal length).
Equipment

Canon EOS 700D DSLR camera body