Depth of Field

I belong to the Yarnographer's group on Ravelry. I have always had a strong fascination with photography. I have just never had the skills necessary to create those incredible shots. I look through knitting blog after knitting blog and drool over their incredible pictures of their projects, or of their newest yarn aquisitions and sigh whistfully because I would love to be able to compose a shot like that. Heck, I'd like to be able to get the color right!

Most of all, I want to take some of those artsy pictures where part of the item is in focus and the rest fades off into beautiful, lovely, fuzzyness. You know the ones. The ones that make you think "Wow! She must be some tallented knitter. That piece looks amazing!" or "I absolutely MUST have that yarn. It looks so soft. There is a "High class" element to these pictures. They make me swoon. But, alas, the ability to create them with anything other than photo editing software has aluded me... Until today.
I have tried and tried to do this, but it just magically happened yesterday when I was photographing a custom order. It was so easy. I was shocked. Why couldn't I do this before?! I was convinced that my camera was incapable of doing this, and yet, there it was. Perfect and lovely.

Try an experiment. Place your item on a white piece of card stock next to a window. Do not put the item in the direct path of the sunlight, just in the ambiant light that the window gives. Arange the item in a pleasing line leading away from you. Set the camera to the macro mode (it looks like a flower). Now set the camera right down on the table in front of the item. Don't hold the camera, don't put it on a tripod, just plunk it down on the table as close as the camera will let you get. Focus it on the very front of the item and click.

Did it work for you too?!

Next up, let's see if it works on my current WIP!