Nikon F3AF instruction manual Depth of Field

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Depth of Field

When you shoot at a certain aperture and focusing distance, you will find that not only the main subject but objects in a cer- tain distance range in front of and behind it will be sharp in the final photograph . Objects beyond this range become increas- ingly out of focus . This "in-focus zone" is known as depth of field . When this zone of sharpness is large, the depth of field is said to be deep; when it is small, the depth of field is said to be shallow.

The following is true of depth of field :

1)The smaller the shooting aperture (i.e. the larger the numeri- cal f-number), the deeper the depth of field ; the larger the aperture, the shallower the depth of field .

2)The farther away the subject is from the lens, the deeper the' depth of field becomes; the closer to the lens, the shallower the depth of field .

3)The longer the focal length of a lens, the shallower the depth of field at each f/stop ; the shorter the focal length, the deeper the depth of field .

4)There is greater depth of field behind the main subject than

in front of it.

The depth of field at each aperture is indicated on the lens by a set of color-coded lines ® (corresponding to the colors of the f-numbers on the aperture ring) which are used in conjunction with the distance scale @ . The range is indicated by the dis- tance between the lines.

Note: Certain Zoom -Nikkor and special-purpose Nikkor lenses do not have a depth-of-field scale.

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