Below, I’ve included a few images with nice bokeh so you can see exactly what you can achieve with the right approach.
All About that Bokeh: How to Shoot a Bokeh Background
Sure, a good photograph is all about the subject — but what about the background? What’s behind the subject (and what’s in front) can either give a detailed sense of the scene, or put more emphasis on the subject by blurring the distractions into dreamy shapes and colors known as bokeh.
Bokeh is created by using a wide aperture to render a busy background into a soft expanse of color, turning small points of light into soft circles. his establishes a shallow depth of field which causes the background to blur. But, there is such a thing as “good” bokeh and “bad” bokeh— so what’s the difference and how do you get that blurry background effect? Here’s what you need to know to shoot a bokeh background just as artistic as the main focal point.
In this guide you will learn:
- What is Bokeh and the difference between good and bad bokeh?
- How to shoot background bokeh
- How to troubleshoot background bokeh
What is bokeh?
Bokeh (pronounced bok-uh or bo-kay) is all about the blur in a photo, and, more specifically, the quality of that blur. The term comes from the Japanese word boke, which means blur.
Bokeh can sometimes refer to background blur in it’s entirety, but the term is also often used to refer to the circular orbs created by out of focus light. Sometimes, this light is obvious, like unfocused Christmas lights, while other times the lights may be more subtle — sunlight filtering through leaves or even reflecting off a surface can also create circular bokeh. Background bokeh is common, but bokeh can also sometimes be in the foreground of an image as well.
The more the background (or foreground) is blurred, the more likely it is that you’ll capture circular bokeh. Shooting with a fast lens with a wide open aperture helps to create bokeh, but so does getting up close to a subject and keeping the focal point far away from anything else in the background.
So what’s “good” bokeh?
You may have heard photographers ask, how good is the bokeh? or say look at that amazing bokeh — but what makes bokeh good? Aren’t out-of-focus circles just out-of-focus circles?
While the subject may be the star of the photograph, bokeh determines just how much that object (or person) stands out from the background. Good bokeh is generally considered as a soft background. Those orbs created by light points will have smooth edges that slowly fade, instead of ending abruptly.
— Photo: Casey Cosley
Circles with harder edges tend to be less visually appealing, since they distract more from the subject. Bokeh can even be awkwardly shaped — the number of aperture blades the lens has determines the shape of the bokeh, if there’s only a few, that circle will actually look more like a hexagon.
Most newer lenses create a circular bokeh with a higher number of aperture blades — but even with new lenses, all bokeh is not created equal. Prime lenses tend to have better bokeh than zoom lenses because they typically have wider apertures. Even within prime lenses though, some options are better than others. Most lens manufacturers have a general prime lens and a pro or art lens. That high-end lens tends to have special lens coatings and optics designed for a softer background — some of them even reach apertures wider than f/1.8. These lenses tend to be pricey, however, and for enthusiasts and beginners, basic prime lenses are often an affordable way to get that background bokeh.
What is bokeh in photography?
Bokeh refers to the out-of-focus areas of an image, especially areas that are heavily blurred. It appears as characteristic rounded shapes in the background of photos.
Many professional photographers use this bokeh effect in their images; it helps the main subject stand out, plus it can add an element of artistry to the overall shot. Portrait photographers often rely on creamy background bokeh to elevate their compositions, but you can also find heavy use of bokeh in wildlife photography, product photography, food photography, and event photography.
Note that, generally speaking, the term “bokeh” refers to any background (or foreground) blur in an image. So you can get beautiful bokeh (when the out-of-focus areas are smooth and stunning), or you can get bad bokeh (when the out-of-focus areas are too detailed or appear jagged). Later on in this article, I’ll explain what causes good versus bad bokeh, but for now, just know that not all bokeh looks equally gorgeous.
The 5 factors determining the bokeh effect in your photos
Beginners often struggle to capture lovely bokeh effects, and it’s because bokeh can be complicated; it’s not as simple as adjusting one setting on your camera and calling it a day.
Instead, the bokeh quality in your photos is influenced by five factors:
- Aperture size (i.e., the size of the hole in the lens that lets in light)
- Lens choice
- Distance between the camera and your subject
- Distance between the subject and the background
- Quality of the background
Let’s look at each factor in turn, starting with:
1. Aperture size
The aperture is a hole in the lens, and the size corresponds to your camera’s f-number setting.
A low f-number such as f/1.8 or f/2.8 will give you a wide aperture, while a high f-number such as f/11 or f/16 will give you a narrow aperture. Ultimately, a wide aperture will create a better bokeh effect – because the wider the aperture, the more background blur the lens will produce.
A narrow aperture, on the other hand, produces images that are sharp from foreground to background; that’s why landscape photographers nearly always shoot at f/8 and beyond. They want everything in focus!
So when you see beautiful bokeh images, they’re generally produced at f/4 and wider (and most are produced at f/2.8, f/1.8, or even f/1.2).
Unfortunately, not all lenses allow you to shoot at ultra-wide apertures, as I explain below:
2. Lens choice
Certain lenses produce beautiful, creamy bokeh. Other lenses are rather underwhelming in their bokeh quality. Why?
It has to do with several factors.
First, the larger the lens’s maximum aperture, the better the bokeh quality. As discussed above, if you can open your lens’s aperture really wide, the bokeh will look great – whereas a closed-down aperture will produce nervous, distracting bokeh that doesn’t complement the subject.
Second, some lenses offer more circular apertures, whereas other lenses have hexagonal, septagonal, or octagonal apertures. Because aperture shape generally determines the shape of the bokeh, the more circular the aperture, the smoother the bokeh effect.
(Note that aperture shape is primarily determined by the aperture blade count, which you can find on the specification sheet of every lens. More blades equal a more circular aperture, which in turn corresponds to more pleasing bokeh. Got it?)
Third, the longer the lens, the more it compresses the background, and the blurrier the background becomes. With bokeh, longer equals better.
So for the best bokeh, purchase a lens with a long focal length (e.g., 200mm), a wide maximum aperture (e.g., f/2.8), and plenty of aperture blades (9+).
3. Distance between the camera and your subject
As you get closer to your subject, the background bokeh effect will magnify – and as you step away from your subject, the bokeh effect will disappear.
So the closer you get, the better the bokeh effect.
Now, you can get close to your subject in two ways:
You can move toward them physically and literally bring the lens close.
Or you can use a telephoto lens with a 300mm, 400mm, or even 800mm focal length. These lenses will zoom right up to your subject (and you don’t have to change your position).
The telephoto lens option is often convenient, especially if you’re working with skittish subjects (e.g., birds and wildlife). But sometimes it’s nice to get up close and personal, especially if you’re going for a more intimate perspective (as I often recommend for portrait photography).
4. Distance between the subject and the background
If your background is close to your subject, it will be less blurred – and hence the bokeh effect will be weaker.
But if your background is far from your subject, it will be more blurred, and will generally look very nice.
Say you’re photographing a child in front of a tree. If you put them just in front of the tree (so the bark touches their back), both the child and the tree will be in focus, and you’ll get very little bokeh to speak of. But if you bring the child out and away from the tree, the bark will begin to blur.
In fact, increasing the subject-background distance is one of the easiest ways to create better bokeh, especially if you don’t own a wide-aperture lens. The farther your subject moves from the background, the more beautiful the result.
5. Quality of the background
Some backgrounds are easy to blur, and other backgrounds are much more difficult.
This often works as you’d expect, where uniform elements (e.g., a forest of green leaves) create very smooth bokeh, while messy, jagged elements (e.g., a crowd of people, cars, and houses) create very distracting bokeh.
But there are other background qualities to consider, too.
For instance, if you compose your image so that the light shines through an area of the background, you’ll often capture stunning bokeh effects. That’s how you can get a shot like this one:
Do you see how the light from the sky shines through the leaves in the background? It creates a very well-defined, circular bokeh effect, which a lot of photographers love.
Bokeh photography factors: putting it all together
The five factors I discussed above work together to achieve optimal bokeh quality.
So even if you can’t adjust one factor (e.g., lens quality), you can still adjust other factors to get a nice result.
Of course, the best bokeh effect comes from maximizing each and every one of the factors discussed above, though this isn’t always feasible. Sometimes, you need a narrow aperture for an unrelated reason, or you need the subject to stay close to the background, or you can’t get close, etc. And that’s where you’ll need to consider the other bokeh factors and work with the ones you can control.
Bokeh and sensor size
Have you ever wondered how the size of your camera’s sensor affects bokeh? You’re not alone! Many photographers, especially when choosing a new camera, want to know if there’s a link between sensor size and beautiful background bokeh.
Let’s start with the basics. If you compare side-by-side images from APS-C and full-frame cameras, both using 50mm lenses, you’ll notice that the photos are different. The image from the APS-C camera will look tighter, while the full-frame image will be wider. This difference is not because of the sensor’s inherent properties but rather because the smaller sensor effectively crops the image.
Technically, the images reaching the back of the camera will be identical, but as they’re captured by the sensor, the APS-C file gets cropped. This means that the depth of field (the area in focus) will match perfectly in both files, even though the APS-C image appears tighter. To achieve the same composition as the full-frame image, the APS-C camera would need to be moved forward several feet.
So what’s the bottom line? The larger the sensor size, the better the bokeh will look in a similar composition. It’s not a property inherent to larger sensors but a result of the internal cropping that happens with smaller sensors. Understanding this will help you get the most out of your camera, no matter the sensor size.
