Landscape photography often require enormous depth of field (depth of the field {part of the image} in sharp focus). When we place an interesting object right in front of the image that has to be pin sharp AND we also want the mountain range in the distant background to be pin sharp we may run out of options to achieve this. The first line of attack it to use a small F.Stop to attempt to get everything sharp.

          This does not always work simply because the front object is too close to the lens. Next we focus using the hyper-focal distance of the lens and camera (see a previous blog on this). What if that too fails? Yes, the image is sharp but everything is just not pin sharp. Perhaps diffraction (using too small of an F.Stop) eroded a bit of the sharpness. Perhaps the breeze is blowing a bit and your front object's leave are moving slightly. The small F.Stop results in a long shutter speed, so now your leaves are not that sharp. You are already using a good tripod and camera technique to eliminate vibrations and camera movement. Now what? Yes, a tilt and shift lens may help, but let's be honest, how many people own a tilt and shift lens?

          Have you ever considered using focus stacking? Focus stacking is a technique whereby you take multiple shots each focused at a different place to later combine in software only using the pin sharp part of each photograph. Focus stacking is used to great effect by macro photographers, but it works just as well for landscapers. Look, the best lens performance typically takes place a F. 8. This F.Stop also allows in more light to allow for a faster shutter speeds or a lower ISO than do F. 16, for example. The faster shutter speed solves your breeze problem and a lower ISO gives you a cleaner images from a noise perspective.

          So set your camera on F. 8. Still use the good camera technique to get the sharpest images (mirror lock up or live view; remote shutter release, good tripod, etc.). Now focus right on your interesting foreground element. You will always get your best focus (for non-moving landscape images) using manual focus and by magnifying the area you are focusing on by 10x (use live view or a mirrorless electronic view finder). Take your shot. Now just turn your lens' focusing ring a little towards a slightly greater focusing distance. Take shot number two. Repeat the process until you get to infinity. Take five to eight or so images.

          Now you have an image with pin sharp focus at every depth in your image from the very first element in your shot to the last mountain peak in the distance. The only thing left to do is to erase the out of focus parts of each image and to combine the in focus parts of each image into one single image. You may think that, that is impossible or difficult to do. Come back next week! If you have a late version of Photoshop you too can do focus stacking to get pin sharp images, front to back. I will teach you to do it in mere seconds.

          Here is a classic example of an image with a foreground that was very close to the lens. The foreground is sharp and the sharpness goes fairly deep into the image. However, the last sand dune is not that sharp and neither is the mountain range way in the background. Had I done focus stacking here I would have been able to get the back mountain as sharp as the foreground (other than the negative effect of atmospheric conditions).

Go out and shoot your focus stacking series of images so that you are ready for processing next week.