DOF issues

[crockny]

f/22 ISO 200 1/50 with my nifty fifty

I still don't totally understand how to focus in certain situation - maybe because I'm self taught (with the help of DPS!).

I wanted to get all the stems in focus. I couldn't get close enough with my 50mm to get the angle/composition I wanted but figured I could crop it. I couldn't get it all in focus no matter what I did or where I focused. I had tried this shot previously with my Tamron 18-270 at full length but figured that was creating a shallow DOF and thought the 50mm would work better. Would a wide angle lens be better? Or am I trying to do the impossible ....

[autofocus]

You also have to consider that DOF is also influenced by how physically close you either are, or how zoomed in you are to the subject. So, no matter how small you make your aperture, the fact that you are very close to the subject will effect DOF. Inherently, wide angle lens have more DOF, but to frame the image such as you did, you'd still have to be very close (actually closer) to the subject...therefore, the same problem. You can try standing further away from the subject while using a small aperture, and then crop the image to the size you want. Don't forget, very small apertures can also create focus issues because of lens diffraction...so, you may want to try this from a greater distance, at say f/11, lowest ISO setting to promote more clarity in your crop, and do so on a tripod or firm base. See if this works out better for you

Added: Remember DOF is a relative thing..in theory, only one part or plane of the image will be tack sharp..all the rest will only be acceptably sharp at best

[Doug Sundseth]

From the articles I've seen the minimum focus distance for that lens is 1.5', so depending on how close you are, the nearer branches may be impossible to pull into focus. Once you're sure you can focus on the nearer stuff, check your depth of field at DOFMaster to make sure you can get the depth you need.

[baajero]

Hi crockny, I had similar issues for quite some time. There's a nice video on youtube by adorama that explains DOF quite nicely. There are 4 factors and you need to take all 4 factors in consideration. The video explains it beautifully. here is the link

Digital Photography 1 on 1: Episode 12 Depth of Field - YouTube

[Omar Tayfour]

theres another solution if u kept trying and no 100% results,go to youtube and search for (focus stacking) its basically u take the exact same image at diff DOFs and each one focuses on a part thats missin from the other then u focus stack them into one perfectly focused image
try this one for an example
Focus Stacking in Photoshop CS5 - YouTube
hope this helps