How to make *aka* blured background like this

[Radim]

Hello,

I love photos like this. Is there some simple tutorial or plugin to do this from common / regular photo?

[LeviFiction]

Well, I don't know about simple. But there are a few ways to fake Depth of Field in a photo.

The Depth Of Field tool is supposed to be used for something similar to this but would never make anything this good.

My method is a bit longer, and to some a bit ridiculous.


1) Separate the foreground from the background: You can use selections, or the background eraser tool, or masking. Whatever method you're comfortable with just make sure that the areas you want to be in focus are on their own layer and separated from the background.

2) On the background layer erase the foreground object: Now that you have the foreground on its own layer you don't need it to be on the background layer. In fact you want to replace it with more background. For this something like the object remover tool or cloning help. This is very important because the next step involves blurring the background. And if you blur it while the foreground is still part of the background the foreground will blurr into the background creating a halo. Something that does not exist in your example there.

3) Blur the background. While simple Gaussian blur does very well here it's important to note that if you want it to be really realistic then highlights tend to take on the shape of the aperture of the lens of a camera. Which is a little hard to fake with Gaussian blur. If you don't care about that little detail then just blur away till you're happy.

If you want to try and replicate the aperture shape then I recommend you use the Depth of Field tool to blur the background. It lets you pick the aperture shape and tries to do a better blur.

And that's how you fake depth of field in a photo.

Of course if you wanted to get really crazy, you would separate items into multiple layers depending on how far away they are from the camera blurring each one a different amount so that the blur looks gradual. You'll notice in your example the grass behind the flowers is really blurred (also notice the shape of the highlights) but the flower to the left is also out of focus just not quite as blurry as the rest of the background. So by separating that flower onto its own layer as well you can blur it slightly less than the rest of the background to make it look closer to the camera.

[brucet]

It's not a hard task but each photo will vary depending on the subject matter.

My suggestion, which is not dissimilar to the previous suggestion, is as follows.

Open you file.
Duplicate it.
Then take a hard look at you photo. Something needs to be deleted from the 'top'/"new' layer. (Copy of background). Will it be the subject or the background? That depends on the details and size.
In you example it's not so simple, but I think I would delete the background.
So start with the top layer and the Eraser. Then erase all of the background with the eraser set to hard edge, 1 step and 100% opacity. Erase the bulk of the background. Then as you get closer the the flower reduce the size of your eraser, zoom in and work you way around the flower. (No one said this was a quick job!!! )
When you have the background completely erased then swap to the background layer. Try the various Blurs to get it to your liking.

It's not hard just time consuming. Your subject just happens to one of the more time consuming examples.

good luck.

[teknisyan]

Here's a simple tutorial that I made way back....

http://abielonline.blogspot.com/2010/03 ... using.html

[Radim]

Thank you to all.

[df]

This shot was actually made in camera from the looks of it. The out of focus points of light give the appearance of a pentagon, this happens when the aperture of the lens is in that shape. All out of focus points of light will be the shape of the aperture or if you're lens isn't circular it will take on those characteristics as well. There's even modifiers people use on camera to create interesting effects.
example:
http://photojojo.com/store/awesomeness/bokeh-Kit/
http://www.diyphotography.net/diy_create_your_own_bokeh

This looks a lot like it was shot with a Canon w/ 50mm f/1.8 (thrifty fifty) lens, but any wide aperture (2.0, 1.8, 1.4) would yield similar results. As much as I love PSP, this is more of an in camera type thing.

[LeviFiction]

I agree wholeheartedly df. This really should be limited to the camera as much as possible.

They may even one day make that weird camera that can let you choose the focus after the fact a truly usable device for quality images. So if you're not good at defining the areas you can choose it later.

Sadly, if you're like me, you can't afford cameras with that capability. Mine can zoom but no DoF. So faking is my only option. And then you have ones with limited DoF that can't handle when the focus of the shot and the background are really close.

There are lots of ways to fake it with the actual device but for those cases where you can't, if you don't mind it looking imperfect, a faked DoF isn't half bad. The real disappointment is when people are shown terrible ineffective ways to fake DoF that look "easy" and really ruin the overall look.

Big lesson, if you can do it with the device then do it with the device. Don't rely on being able to edit things. Trust me, I've done enough horrible faked DoF to know there is no replacement for the real thing. If you can't do it on the device then learn to fake it properly. In other words emulating as many elements as possible not just randomly blurring backgrounds and calling it good. A half-baked effect makes for a half-baked image.

[Radim]

Thank you again.

Finaly I get what I needed to know.

[df]

They may even one day make that weird camera that can let you choose the focus after the fact a truly usable device for quality images. So if you're not good at defining the areas you can choose it later.

www.lytro.com