Hyperfocal focusing

[MichaelHarris]

I've been seeing alot about this and wonder what it is?  Is it different than zone focusing and understanding depth of field?  I have a couple of zone focus cameras I like to use and wonder if I'm not getting the most out of them.

Thanks,
Michael

[derevaun]

As I understand it, it's a means of focus so that infinity is just in focus for a given aperture, and of knowing how far in front of infinity will be in focus--acceptable focus, that is. The point between those extreme ends of in-focus is the hyperfocal distance, and that's where you set the focus to. It works out to be different for each focal length and film size.

There's a better explanation and handy online calculator and chart generator here:

http://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html

You can get a lot of mileage from hyperfocal when street shooting, because you can preset the aperture and thus preset the focus; then it's just a matter of making sure your subject is in the zone.

[Tom Hildreth]

I had been curious about hyperfocal technique for some time, and last year at the Sun 'n Fun fly in I used it for most of the event. Not exactly as close as street shooting, the small aircraft that comprise the event turned out to be a great application for the technique. Where previously I would spend time focusing on a part of the aircraft that was closest to me, I just set the lens barrel to the f-stop I was using (often f11) and didn't stop between similar subjects to refocus. It saved me a lot of time and eyestrain, and most importantly, I got sharp images.

Now, for the buxom blonde who's sauntering your way on the sidewalk? I'd try f8, your gonna need some shutter speed to keep all that real estate from producing motion blur....

[connealy]

The hyperfocal distance is that point on your focus scale where sharp focus is obtained from infinity to half of the hyperfocal distance.  The variables are the f-stop, the lens focal length and a somewhat arbitrary selection of the circle of confusion which determines the appearance of sharpness.
    In practice, my own preference is just to set the infinity mark on the lens' dof scale opposite the f-stop I am using, and then look to see the nearest sharp focus point on the other end.  At f/16 with a normal lens, you are going to be pretty good to go from around five feet to inf.
    Some dof scales are more accurate than others.  The one on my Kodak Monitor is wildly inaccurate.  On my Olympus 35 RC, the arc of the focus is so short that the scale is not useful.  Some old folders have dof tables on the back that are useful; for those without, it is helpful to print out a scale from one of those on line calculators.

[JohnR]

I tend to focus a bit further back than the hyperfocal distance eg if the aperture is at f16, set the infinity marker to f11. You don't lose much in the foreground and in theory infinity is sharper -- but I don't have enough experience to say how much difference it really makes...

[Glenn Thoreson]

Connealy hit it rigt on the head. Set the infinity mark on your focus scale at the aperture you want to use. At the center of the scale will be the hyperfocal distance. Everything from half this distance to infinity will be in acceptably sharp focus. The other side of the scale tells you what the near in focus distance is. Some lenses, especially on SLRs aren't practical to use. The settings are so close together as to make it worthless. For cameras without a depth of field scale, just estimate what you want in focus, set at about a third into he scene and stop down to f:16. You'll come close. For long shots with no principal subject, 10 to 20 feet at f:16 will get it. Too many people waste their depth of field by going way past infinty with the available depth. Anything reaching past infinity is wasted.

[Mike Kovacs]

Of course, these distances seem to be for 50mm lenses.  All bets are off when your shooting a 105 in 6x9 format!  E.g. Hagar didn't have a DoF scale and there was no way you could hold 5' to infinity at f/16.

[ImageMaker]

Also important to remember that depth of field is predicated on an "acceptable circle of confusion" -- that is, it's based on an assumption as to how much blur is acceptable.  Sometimes that assumption is correct, and sometimes it's not.  Generally, the larger you'll be printing, up to about 11x14, the smaller the circle of confusion you should use, because up to prints that need to be viewed at greater distance than arms length, the bigger they get the sharper they need to be.

This can get you into trouble if you like your prints crisper and sharper than whoever made the decisions for the DOF scale you're using; where this crops up most frequently is with the large medium format cameras, where the DOF is often calculated with a CoC suitable for contact printing -- but no one contact prints 6x9 cm any more; we enlarge it to 4x6 or larger just as we do 35 mm.  Even a modest 2x enlargement means the CoC has to be selected at half the size to keep a print crisp, and if you're like me and prefer your prints at 8x10 size when you can get 'em that way, you're above 4x -- which means when I use the DOF scale on my Moskva-5, I use the range for the next larger aperture, and then I pay close attention to where things are in the range (and possibly focus on something other than my principle subject in order to control what's in and out of DOF).