Please help me, (history of portraiture) defocused background and portraits

(if this question it is not applicable in this forum, I would like that anyone

tell me which is the best forum to post it!)

I am looking for information about when begin to be used the background

defocused in portraiture.

I just have participated in a history Photography workshop and in it was told

that the defocused background is strongly related with the SLR cameras coming,

because with RF cameras was not possible �to see� the defocused background as a

pre-image and only was possible imagine it. Personally I don�t agree because the

first SLR camera appear in 1936 and before this fact we had i.e. the pictoralism

and the floue and they used defocused image concept. Also in that years the

photographers had a strongly knowledge about optics and DoF. I don�t find

information about this issue, then any suggestion, link, comment, etc is welcome!!!

 

Thanks in advance, dario

Even the earliest cameras were able to 'defocus the background' (ie, shoot with shallow DOF) - and I believe many of these early cameras also made use of ground glass focusing screens, which does show DOF very clearly. I imagine the "all in focus" style of early portrait was just that: a style of the times.

 

Sorry that I cannot tell you anything useful in answer to your question...

"Photography workshop and in it was told that the defocused background is strongly related with the SLR cameras coming, because with RF cameras was not possible ?to see? the defocused background as a pre-image and only was possible imagine it."

 

I would question whether the people conducting the workshop knew anything about the history of photography or cameras. You can see the depth-of-field on a view camera groundglass with the focusing magnifier. While the groundglass does get darker with smaller f/stops, if you pull the focusing cloth tightly around your head and rear camera standard, you can see the image.

 

I's suggest you look at Steichen's early work, Yousuf Karsch, and George Hurrell's work for some examples of work done with view cameras that include defocused backgrounds.

 

Whomever told you this, must never have worked much with view cameras. Since portraits are usually done within a fixed distance range from the camera, and (especially in early photography) with a moderate telephoto lens to help achieve a defocused background - with only a little testing - a photographer can easily learn the characteristics of different f/stops within the distances normally used for portraits.

Hello, I think de-focssed backgrounds may not pass the philosophy of photography forum requirements, it's a technical question really.

 

Anyhow, I was actually wondering the same thing myself earlier today. I was thinking if I could get a very shallow depth of field with my 4x5 camera since I have plenty bellows.

 

On the more philosophical side, I think depth of field is a 3 dimensional concept.

 

Cheers.

It's very difficult to AVOID getting a defocused background on a portrait shot on a view camera with a standard (i.e. a portrait) lens. Now you come to mention it though, I can't think of any 19th C studio images that employ the effect (Nadar, Brady, etc.). They must have taken great pains to deploy their lighting. However, it's clearly nonsense to suggest that it was an innovation related to 35mm SLRs - not least because the default cameras for studio photography after the decline of widespread use of view camera were medium format, which also use ground glass screens.

Who was teaching this workshop? What are their credentials?

 

Here are two links to portraits by Steiglitz and Cameron showing classic selective focus portraits taken in 1864/65 and 1919. I'll bet with any minor amount of work you could find hundreds from all the other greats.

http://www.masters-of-photography.com/S/stieglitz/stieglitz_paul_strand.html

http://www.masters-of-photography.com/C/cameron/cameron_julia_jackson_1864.html

 

History of photography may not strictly fall under "philosophy of photography", but where else would you post it? I'm fine taking a dash of history in my philosophy cocktail.

I agree that the idea of "zone focus," as I used to call it, was around long

before SLR.

 

I wonder, though, if photographers who use rangefinders extensively don't

tend to stop down a bit more in an attempt to capture what they see. Also,

rangefinders in general are better suited to wider lenses, thus more depth of

field.

 

And perhaps SLR users are more apt to open up the lens in an effort to

capture what they see. Also, SLRs were historically much better suited to

longer lenses, as they were notoriously difficult to focus with wide lenses, and

it took a long while for lens designers to come up with wide lenses for SLRs,

given the problem of the mirror. So, longer lenses, less depth of focus.

 

It would be interesting, if there were statistics on this, (which I doubt), to see if

rangefinder photographers in general use a deeper depth of field than do

SLR photographers.

 

Tomasino

Steiglitz often wrote about using a wide aperture for selective focus, and he probably never used one of those new fangled 35mm jobs....he used selective focus techniques back in the late 19th century! One will also find this confirmation of this in his wife's biography: Georgia O'Keffe.

people:

 

thanks by all contributions!! really your support solved my question and doubts about this issue!

 

dario