It's all about the bokeh these days ... you know the blur you get in the background of a photograph when you open up the aperture on your lens and then focus in on a subject that's pretty close. This works best with a focal length of 50mm or more and a wide open aperture!
One important element that helps to accentuate this effect are twinkling lights in the background. It doesn't need to be twinkle lights really but just bits of light shinning through trees will help you get that effect also.
With a little bit of patience and practice you can add some really fun, cool affects to your photographs.
While focusing on a particular subject can be a little challenging, the look is just way to fun to not keep playing till you get a photo that really speak to you. LOVE this love photo!
Ok, how much fun is this photograph? The only thing missing are raindrops on the flower petals.
So ... here I'm purposely out of focus to accentuate the bokeh shaped raindrops.
I love this filter I made. Can you imagine photographing a church or an outdoor wedding using this effect? BEAUTIFUL if you ask me!
Here's what you do:
Trace the lens cap onto a black piece of card stock and cut out circle.
Using a light colored pencil, draw a small shape in the center of the black circle and then cut out using a craft knife.
Cut a strip of black card stock the circumference of the circle and then snip into the strip.
Wrap the clipped strip around the black circle and tape in place.
Now ... go play and experiment!
As you can imagine, the sky is the limit here!
Here are a few other bokeh filters I made. I shot all these at night ... forcing the bokeh effect with the twinkle lights that are hanging from my back patio all year long!
If you're new to this whole photography thing and want to take that DSLR out of auto mode ... You might want to consider taking this class I'm teaching ... Photography 101: Shooting Beyond Auto Mode. I know that the february date is nearly full, but there are still a few spot open for the March 17th date!
