Creating a natural-looking depth of field effect using Adobe Photoshop

 

 

A blurred background is why many photographers choose fast lenses for portraiture. You want to be able to create good separation between your subject and the background to help draw your viewer's attention to the subject. However, you don't always have access to the right lens or be able to shoot a lens wide open, so what can you do when you are unable to get the blurred background in camera? You can use Photoshop.

Aaron Nace of Phlearn shows us how to blur your background and create natural-looking depth of field using Adobe Photoshop in the video below. This technique involves creating a precise selection of your subject, duplicating the selection, removing it from the photo, blurring the remaining portion of the image and then adding your subject(s) back into the frame.

As always, it's best to get the desired results in camera. But for times when it's not possible, Photoshop can often save the day. For more videos like this, head over to phlearn.com. 

(Via Phlearn)