[OT] Stunning WWII manufacturing photos

As a designer of lenses, I hope I can give some insight into why a point and shoot almost always has larger DOF than a 4X5. The DOF (in most photographic situations) is proportional to the focal length divided by the F/#, in other words the inverse of the entrance pupil diameter. If the point and shoot and 4X5 have the same field of view, the small sensor in the point & shoot would need a lens focal length that is perhaps 1/20 as long. To match the point and shoot DOF at F/5, the 4X5 would have to be stopped down to F/100

I have seen some great shots taken with tiny f.l. endoscope lenses that show sharply focused insects in the foreground and large trees in the distance.

It is also true, BTW, that the small pixels in small digital sensors require some fairly fast f/#s to make the diffraction limit not noticeable. The iPhone 4S camera, for example, is F/2.4 and has 1.4 micron pixels.

Thanks. A normal lens for that small sensor sure does have some depth of field. My Minox III does the same thing -- 9.5 mm film. \ At the other end, I've used a 310 mm normal lens for 8 x 10, and it was f/64, f/128, or nothing.

It occured to me that some of the other posters might have confused a large depth of field with the impression of depth given by a small depth of field. In other words, a small DOF can give some clue about the distance to objects in the scene, whereas a large DOF might make the scene look flatter and less

3-dimensional. However, I have also heard people use the term "depth" in photography to refer to dynamic range, color saturation, or a well-distributed tone histogram. In digital sensor design, "well depth" refers to how many photo-electrons can be stored for each pixel during exposure, and it affects the noise and dynamic range of the sensor. Depth used by itself is a pretty ambiguous term.

"Depth" is a pretty vague term, but I think I've heard it mostly in reference to the appearance of 3D depth in a photo, and selective focus can indeed enhance that impression.

One big factor that contributes to the 3D look, which we often overlook these days, is adjacent-area contrast, at which Ansel Adams was the master. Combined with the tonal-range compression he got by using the Zone System, the effect was mysteriously 3D in his photos.

Also, the imaging chips have a far smaller acceptance angle (off normal) for incoming light than silver-based film. This in effect requires the lens to be near telecentric on the image side.

Joe Gwinn

overall yes, that is what I meant, and it was not meant specifically to those photos, my response was meant, generally speaking, saying "I" personally like film photo's over digital, I guess why I do is because the class I took, was from a commercial photographer, he spent a little time showing us complete newbs some nice med format and large format photo's and the negatives, (8*10 was the largest he had there, those were awesome) it was my first time seeing slides side by side of the prints as well, sometimes your first impressions are most impressive, he was from N.Y. and had some pretty neat stuff of the city as well, if I could I would build a dark room and learn to develop my own photo's and would probably buy a med format camera of some sort,

I really enjoyed that class, wish I could had continued on, but at least I have a general understanding of how my camera works and how lighting really effects the picture and to add to the picture using surrounding scenes.

that was also the first time I heard of Ansel Adams,

All of my experience is with film, so I can't judge its comparison with digitial. I shot my first commercial digital photos just last year, for an online trade magazine. They were ordinary photojournalism.

They looked good to me but I wasn't scrutinizing them the way I would scrutinize advertising photos or artsy work. I'd have to shoot side-by-side comparisons to identify what's going on, but I have no reason to do that now. Editors want electronic images, NOW, and there is little choice in the matter for me.

it;s probably better in the long run anyhow now, I mean jsut how good can a magazine look tot he naked eye, (at least that was what I thought long ago )

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lighted, a 4x5

first things I

I wish I had the time to play with photography more, I did enjoy it, too many projects going at once is about killing me remove NOT to reply