Posts Tagged ‘OOF’

Bokeh is a word used to describe the out of focus areas of a photo. It does not really mean how out of focus an area is, but rather how the out of focus areas are rendered.

A Cup of Bokeh, please? by Shermeee on flickr (licensed CC-BY)

You will find that some people are very particular about bokeh, while others aren't really bothered. Just like one person might love a particular photo, while another person might think it is nothing special, the bokeh characteristics of a photo can be quite subjective.

Camera lens reviews, particularly those in Japan, now often include photos with out of focus areas particularly so that viewers can judge the bokeh.

There are many 'rules' of photography (I prefer to think of them as guidelines) that we can follow in the effort for outstanding photos. But sometimes not following the rules can result in a more interesting and engaging photograph.

Now, I'm not saying that you shouldn't bother learning the 'rules' of photography, or that you should ignore them completely. Rather, once you have learned the rules, and how they work, you will then know when to make a conscious decision to break a rule.

• Bad: Breaking a rule because you don't know any better.
• Good: Breaking a rule because you want (or don't want) to achieve a certain effect.

With that out of the way, let's look at some examples of where breaking the rules can work well.

If you have a blurry photo, there is only so much you can do to remove (hide) the blur after the fact. Ideally, you want to be aware of what can cause blurry photos, and ensure you correct for this at the time of taking the photo.

In this article we'll look briefly at software methods for "fixing" blurry photos. Then we'll look at the main reasons why the photos come out blurred in the first place, and how to avoid getting blurry photos.