Do you shoot people with a large aperture or a small aperture?

When only the portrait itself needs to be represented, and the clothing of the portrait is not strongly related to the background, it is suggested to adopt a large aperture to highlight people to the extreme; When the background environment is an indispensable element of a photo, we should use a small aperture instead.

Let's talk about portrait photography in detail.

I. About Aperture and Depth of Field

The concept of depth of field is not mentioned here, and everyone must know it. Depth of field is a very important control factor in portrait shooting. The aperture is also related to the focal length of the lens, the aperture size and the distance from the subject.

Therefore, the general portrait lens refers to a fixed-focus or zoom lens with a large aperture of more than 50 mm. Using a large aperture lens means that you can shoot a portrait with a small depth of field with a large aperture, or you can shoot a portrait with a large depth of field with a small aperture. So from this perspective, there are undoubtedly more possibilities for a large aperture.

However, due to the influence of focal length on the depth of field, it is obvious that the medium telephoto lens is easier to create a small depth of field, and the wide angle or ultra-wide angle is easier to create a large depth of field.

Therefore, in fact, there are often more choices for portrait shooting.

Second, the types of portraits.

Portrait photography should be regarded as a major category in photography. There are many ways to divide it, which is nothing more than the relationship between people and scenery. Therefore, from this part, there are two main categories: people close-ups and environmental portraits.

The close-up of people is mainly people, and everything else can be omitted. You can use a large aperture and a medium telephoto lens to construct a small depth of field effect. Environmental portrait emphasizes the harmony and unity between man and environment, and the narrative of environment is very important. Therefore, it is necessary to construct a large depth of field with a small aperture and a wide-angle lens to ensure that people and the environment are clearly visible.

For example, some clothes with distinctive styles, such as Hanfu and Guofeng photography, may be an important part of them and cannot be ignored!

Advantages and disadvantages of large aperture

1, the larger the aperture, the smaller the depth of field.

As mentioned above, the most intuitive function of a large aperture is to obtain a small depth of field. Of course, it should also be noted that in some scenes, it is necessary to ensure that the characters are placed in the depth of field, otherwise it will be counterproductive.

2. The larger the aperture, the greater the luminous flux.

According to the three elements of exposure, the larger the aperture, the smaller the shutter required. In order to ensure a certain safety shutter, a large enough aperture is necessary. Therefore, in low light conditions, such as indoor shooting, large aperture has more advantages.

3, full aperture is generally not very good.

The optical quality of the lens determines that the best image quality is generally not at the full aperture, but after the maximum aperture reduction 1-2. Therefore, try not to use the maximum aperture of the lens unless it is particularly necessary.

Advantages and disadvantages of small aperture

1, the smaller the aperture, the greater the depth of field.

When shooting portraits in the environment, you must use a large depth of field. Especially like wedding photography, if you don't shoot the environment, why go abroad to shoot?