So you’ve got a compact camera and it has a dozen scene modes to choose from one of which is the portrait mode but there are others such as landscape, fireworks etc. They’re OK aren’t they? Generally they work quite well even if they don’t allow for much in the way of fine tuning.

70 mm Portrait                       Wide Angle Portrait

And then you make the transition from digital compact to digital SLR and suddenly, your choices are much more limited. You might get portrait, landscape, sports and macro but anything beyond that means you need to know a thing or two about setting your camera for a particular type of photo and of course, you want to get a little more creative and go beyond the formulaic settings that make all your images look like everyone else’s. What’s worse is you spend a good chunk of money on your digital SLR and the results from your compact look better. Surely that can’t be right. A digital SLR should give results much better than a compact.

Well it will give better results as soon as you have an understanding of how all those scene modes work. Once you get that, you can play with the settings on your SLR to recreate them but of course you want to do more than that. And you will, once you understand the scene modes you can apply those settings to your digital SLR but with an unparalleled level of control to take your photography to the next level.

So let’s get started.

Portrait Mode

There are a couple of things your compact will do to achieve that portrait look. First of all it sets an a relatively wide aperture to reduce depth of field, it’s this setting that reduces depth of field so that the model’s face is in focus but the background is nicely blurred, in effect, it isolates the in focus parts from the out of focus parts thus avoiding unsightly backgrounds that might otherwise spoil a good photo.

Secondly and just as important it adjusts the focal length of your lens to make sure the perspective is correct. A focal length that is too short i.e. 24mm can distort facial features making noses and ears look larger than they are. Not very flattering for your model and you can be sure they won’t be asking you to take their photo again.

Wide Angle Portrait
Image courtesy Lucky Oliver © Paul Paladin

Look at this image above. It was taken on a wide angle lens maybe around 28mm but see how the face is distorted. The background is in focus (large depth of field) and distracts from the model. Of course, if you are after a quirky look this might be just what you want but how do you avoid it?

Well first of all, a focal length of around 70mm or more on a digital SLR is enough to flatten the perspective and an aperture of around f/5.6 will blur the background nicely to concentrate attention on the face of the model.

70 mm Portrait
Image courtesy Lucky Oliver © Paul Paladin

This is much more flattering. Notice how the dimensions of the model’s face appear much more natural and importantly, the background is much less distracting as it is out of focus. This is what the portrait mode on your compact will try to achieve. However, setting this manually with your DSLR gives you much more control. Try 90mm or 100mm to see how it changes. Varying the combination of focal length and shutter speed will allow you to create any variation between the two images above to give you full creative control because there may be a time when you want to get that comical distorted look. The relationship is this:

Shorter focal lengths = more distortion.

Larger aperture = more blurring of the background.

And one thing not set by the camera is the distance of the subject from the lens. Closer to the lens means more distortion.

Start with the 70mm and f/5.6 combination with your DSLR and experiment by changing the focal length. Once you see that relationship, try again with different apertures.

If you wanted to get that distorted look with a compact then you could do it by setting your camera to landscape mode, which will give a short focal length and a small aperture. Then get your model close to the camera. But be warned, she may not thank you for it.