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"That's just not how lenses work, fundamentally." Go to the wikipedia page on depth of field and see how it is calculated. "Cheap macro lenses in 2021 are typ

"That's just not how lenses work, fundamentally." Go to the wikipedia page on depth of field and see how it is calculated. "Cheap macro lenses in 2021 are typically around 24mm" You claimed they were the norm. Now it's that they simply exist. "Focus stacking is needed" Focus stacking is needed when the depth of field is so small that the resulting photo would be unpleasant. This is the case for almost all macro photographs shot on SLRs. It's interesting that someone else claimed this is a fixed issue and posted a photo that looks like it was taken with one of those terrible lens adapter kits. If that is one's standard for "fixed", then sure, but most of us have higher standards.

foldr 5y ago
I think you are right if you hold constant the CoC. In that case the DoF is proportional to the f number but inversely proportional to the square of the focal length (http://graphics.stanford.edu/courses/cs178/applets/dof.html http://graphics.stanford.edu/courses/cs178/applets/dof.html). However, for a smaller format, we arguably ought to reduce the CoC proportionally. And I think that reduction will end up canceling out one factor of f, bringing us back to the ratio of the focal length to the f stop (i.e. the absolute diameter of the aperture).
- defaultname 5y ago
  The focal length input is squared, but the CoC impact is linear. The iPhone has a small CoC compared to SLRs, but its input on the calculation is undersized relative to focal length. The iPhone is widely assumed to have a CoC of 0.004mm (this actually increases on the most recent iPhone, though it's tough to get precise numbers). A Nikon D5000 (going with an equivalent resolution -- larger pixels -- on an ASP-C camera) has a CoC of 0.020. So let's calculate hyperfocal distance of the two systems for the same effective focal length (but obviously very different real focal lengths)- iPhone 12 telephoto lens - 65mm (7.5mm real) equivalent, f2.2. Nikon D5000 equivalent lens - 65mm (43mm real) equivalent, f2.2. For the iPhone, the HF is 6.4m. For the Nikon, it is 54.3m. For those who don't know, hyperfocus is the point where everything from 1/2 of that distance to infinity is in focus if you set the focus to that magical point. It's a proxy for the other depth of field calculations, and is the simplest to demonstrate. Anyone who owns an iPhone w a "telephoto" and an ASP-C SLR w/ a 50mm lens needs to try to replicate bokeh at various distances without the computational bokeh. Focus on a subject at 1m, 2m, 4m, etc at the same aperture. Close down the aperture on the SLR even.
  - foldr 5y ago
    Holding constant the target resolution, you need a smaller CoC in proportion to the difference in focal lengths (assuming the viewing angle is also held constant). That removes one of the factors of f. I think it makes sense to assume the same target resolution for the iPhone and the DSLR, even though this isn’t true in practice. The DSLR user is obviously free to downsample their photo to a lower resolution and thereby (in a rather uninteresting way) gain more depth of field. We shouldn’t be giving the iPhone extra DoF points just because it happens to have a lower resolution. So we are not talking about any empirically derived value for the iPhone’s CoC. The CoC here is a value derived for each format from an arbitrarily chosen target resolution.
    - defaultname 5y ago
      "I think it makes sense to assume the same target resolution for the iPhone and the DSLR, even though this isn’t true in practice" It yields a practically perfect comparison of focus. This isn't a trick or handicapping, and the degree of focus/defocus is identical whether that SLR had 10x the resolution. There is utterly nothing arbitrary chosen here, and the amount a tree 10 feet outside the focus is out of focus will be identical on a 12MP SLR or a 24, 48, or 96MP version with the same focal length / f / sensor size.
      - foldr 5y ago
        My point was that it doesn’t matter what resolution we choose as long as we do the calculations based on the same resolution for both the iPhone and the DSLR (and hence with different values for the CoC in each case, given the different sensor sizes). Thus your value for the iPhone’s CoC derived from its pixel size is irrelevant. We can choose any target resolution we like to make the comparison and get the same result (comparatively speaking). By resolution here I’m talking about what we could crudely measure in megapixels. Say for example that we have a target resolution of 5MP. We then calculate the corresponding CoC for both cameras based on their respective sensor sizes. You’ll find that the CoC for the iPhone will be smaller in proportion to the difference in focal lengths between the iPhone and DSLR. That cancels out one of the factors of f. Sudosysgen is saying the same thing, but without going indirectly via the DoF formula that you’ve been using.
sudosysgen 5y ago
24mm is a normal focal length for entry level macro lenses nowadays, yes. They don't just exist, they are very common in the entry level market. If you want to get those kinds of macro shots that's what you'll get. If your goal for macro photography is to take a picture that is reasonably sharp at 12MP 2cm away with a magnification of less than 2, then yes, getting acceptable depth of field is a solved problem. Set your wide angle macro lens to F/22 and there you go. If you have higher standards, then the problem is not fixed on DSLRs. But the iPhone doesn't do it either. If you don't understand why using the CoC criteria for depth of field is incorrect on two cameras with vastly different sensor sizes, I can't help you. The only measure for depth of field that works across cameras with two different sensor sizes is the ratio of distance and aperture diameter, which determines the solid angle of light capture. You're the one that brought up physics, so actually look at the physics instead of using photographer's ready-made formulas without actually understanding them and where they break down. As for the image that you replied to, it doesn't look any worse at all to the images in the post technically. If you look at the image of the lightning connector, it doesn't even have 2mm of depth of field at a pretty low actual resolution. You can say whatever you want as for the composition and artistic value, that's not what we're talking about.
- defaultname 5y ago
  "I can't help you" No, you can't, because you are painfully ignorant on this topic. Literally, spend 30 minutes with an iPhone and an SLR and you'd be illuminated. Instead you seriously argue that I need to look at the "physics" (which is farcical when you ignore the most important part of a camera, which is the focusing from the lens to the sensor. Dismissing that betrays a complete misunderstanding of optics). This conversation is clearly futile, but again - spend 30 minutes and actually test your theories. Or, you know, read any single article on the tubes. Or how about simply ask yourself "why does the iPhone need to do computational bokeh"? 65mm equivalent lens, f/2.2...should be the easiest thing in the world. In SLR world that is bokeh gold.
  - sudosysgen 5y ago
    I have a phone with a macro lens. I have a mirrorless camera. As I told you, what matters for bokeh is the distance to the object and the diameter of the aperture. The iPhone needs computational bokeh because the aperture is 2.4mm wide, whereas one of my lenses has a 40mm aperture. That's why my camera produces more bokeh - the aperture has a wider diameter while the distance to the object is the same. That is literally the one and only thing that matters. The diameter of the lens, and the distance from the object. Take a piece of paper, draw the lens as a slit, draw the object as a point, and make a line from the two edges of the slit to the point, that continues furhter back. You'll get two triangles. Everything that is contained in those two triangles will be focused to the same point on the sensor. That's why the ratio between the two is what matters. That's why closer objects produce a more out of focus background than objects farther appart. That's what I'm trying to explain to you. The DoF formula that photographers use does not work for comparisons across two different film sizes.

foldr 5y ago

I think you are right if you hold constant the CoC. In that case the DoF is proportional to the f number but inversely proportional to the square of the focal length (http://graphics.stanford.edu/courses/cs178/applets/dof.html http://graphics.stanford.edu/courses/cs178/applets/dof.html). However, for a smaller format, we arguably ought to reduce the CoC proportionally. And I think that reduction will end up canceling out one factor of f, bringing us back to the ratio of the focal length to the f stop (i.e. the absolute diameter of the aperture).

defaultname 5y ago
The focal length input is squared, but the CoC impact is linear. The iPhone has a small CoC compared to SLRs, but its input on the calculation is undersized relative to focal length. The iPhone is widely assumed to have a CoC of 0.004mm (this actually increases on the most recent iPhone, though it's tough to get precise numbers). A Nikon D5000 (going with an equivalent resolution -- larger pixels -- on an ASP-C camera) has a CoC of 0.020. So let's calculate hyperfocal distance of the two systems for the same effective focal length (but obviously very different real focal lengths)- iPhone 12 telephoto lens - 65mm (7.5mm real) equivalent, f2.2. Nikon D5000 equivalent lens - 65mm (43mm real) equivalent, f2.2. For the iPhone, the HF is 6.4m. For the Nikon, it is 54.3m. For those who don't know, hyperfocus is the point where everything from 1/2 of that distance to infinity is in focus if you set the focus to that magical point. It's a proxy for the other depth of field calculations, and is the simplest to demonstrate. Anyone who owns an iPhone w a "telephoto" and an ASP-C SLR w/ a 50mm lens needs to try to replicate bokeh at various distances without the computational bokeh. Focus on a subject at 1m, 2m, 4m, etc at the same aperture. Close down the aperture on the SLR even.
- foldr 5y ago
  Holding constant the target resolution, you need a smaller CoC in proportion to the difference in focal lengths (assuming the viewing angle is also held constant). That removes one of the factors of f. I think it makes sense to assume the same target resolution for the iPhone and the DSLR, even though this isn’t true in practice. The DSLR user is obviously free to downsample their photo to a lower resolution and thereby (in a rather uninteresting way) gain more depth of field. We shouldn’t be giving the iPhone extra DoF points just because it happens to have a lower resolution. So we are not talking about any empirically derived value for the iPhone’s CoC. The CoC here is a value derived for each format from an arbitrarily chosen target resolution.
  - defaultname 5y ago
    "I think it makes sense to assume the same target resolution for the iPhone and the DSLR, even though this isn’t true in practice" It yields a practically perfect comparison of focus. This isn't a trick or handicapping, and the degree of focus/defocus is identical whether that SLR had 10x the resolution. There is utterly nothing arbitrary chosen here, and the amount a tree 10 feet outside the focus is out of focus will be identical on a 12MP SLR or a 24, 48, or 96MP version with the same focal length / f / sensor size.
    - foldr 5y ago
      My point was that it doesn’t matter what resolution we choose as long as we do the calculations based on the same resolution for both the iPhone and the DSLR (and hence with different values for the CoC in each case, given the different sensor sizes). Thus your value for the iPhone’s CoC derived from its pixel size is irrelevant. We can choose any target resolution we like to make the comparison and get the same result (comparatively speaking). By resolution here I’m talking about what we could crudely measure in megapixels. Say for example that we have a target resolution of 5MP. We then calculate the corresponding CoC for both cameras based on their respective sensor sizes. You’ll find that the CoC for the iPhone will be smaller in proportion to the difference in focal lengths between the iPhone and DSLR. That cancels out one of the factors of f. Sudosysgen is saying the same thing, but without going indirectly via the DoF formula that you’ve been using.

sudosysgen 5y ago

24mm is a normal focal length for entry level macro lenses nowadays, yes. They don't just exist, they are very common in the entry level market. If you want to get those kinds of macro shots that's what you'll get. If your goal for macro photography is to take a picture that is reasonably sharp at 12MP 2cm away with a magnification of less than 2, then yes, getting acceptable depth of field is a solved problem. Set your wide angle macro lens to F/22 and there you go. If you have higher standards, then the problem is not fixed on DSLRs. But the iPhone doesn't do it either. If you don't understand why using the CoC criteria for depth of field is incorrect on two cameras with vastly different sensor sizes, I can't help you. The only measure for depth of field that works across cameras with two different sensor sizes is the ratio of distance and aperture diameter, which determines the solid angle of light capture. You're the one that brought up physics, so actually look at the physics instead of using photographer's ready-made formulas without actually understanding them and where they break down. As for the image that you replied to, it doesn't look any worse at all to the images in the post technically. If you look at the image of the lightning connector, it doesn't even have 2mm of depth of field at a pretty low actual resolution. You can say whatever you want as for the composition and artistic value, that's not what we're talking about.

defaultname 5y ago
"I can't help you" No, you can't, because you are painfully ignorant on this topic. Literally, spend 30 minutes with an iPhone and an SLR and you'd be illuminated. Instead you seriously argue that I need to look at the "physics" (which is farcical when you ignore the most important part of a camera, which is the focusing from the lens to the sensor. Dismissing that betrays a complete misunderstanding of optics). This conversation is clearly futile, but again - spend 30 minutes and actually test your theories. Or, you know, read any single article on the tubes. Or how about simply ask yourself "why does the iPhone need to do computational bokeh"? 65mm equivalent lens, f/2.2...should be the easiest thing in the world. In SLR world that is bokeh gold.
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  I have a phone with a macro lens. I have a mirrorless camera. As I told you, what matters for bokeh is the distance to the object and the diameter of the aperture. The iPhone needs computational bokeh because the aperture is 2.4mm wide, whereas one of my lenses has a 40mm aperture. That's why my camera produces more bokeh - the aperture has a wider diameter while the distance to the object is the same. That is literally the one and only thing that matters. The diameter of the lens, and the distance from the object. Take a piece of paper, draw the lens as a slit, draw the object as a point, and make a line from the two edges of the slit to the point, that continues furhter back. You'll get two triangles. Everything that is contained in those two triangles will be focused to the same point on the sensor. That's why the ratio between the two is what matters. That's why closer objects produce a more out of focus background than objects farther appart. That's what I'm trying to explain to you. The DoF formula that photographers use does not work for comparisons across two different film sizes.