Embracing the blur with Bokeh

Photos are from students in COMM 1318 Photography 1

Sometimes an assignment looks hard but turns out to be easy. It’s even better if it turns out to be fun. Students in COMM 1318 Photography 1 recently appeared to experience both with Bokeh.

Bokeh is a photo technique of creating a pleasing “blur”.

They placed a black drape over scaffolding for a dark background in the darkened TV studio. They strung Christmas or Halloween lights over the drape. Then they experimented.

Using a wide aperture, F-1.8, created the shallowest depth of field. So, whatever was directly in front of the camera was in focus, while the lights in the background became “blurry”.

The shape of the blur depends on the shape of the camera’s aperture. So, holding a piece of black cardboard over the lens with a small heart or star cut out, it makes that shape appear in the photo, almost like magic.

This semester, students got creative and made blurs bubble out of mugs, vases, cameras, ghost buckets, jack-o-lanterns, and even action figures.

Here is the best of their work.