Photo Assignment 5: Mastering depth-of-field

SMU student Quinn Kilroy sits at the breakfast table in the Sigma Alpha Epsilon house, Sunday, Sept. 29, 2025, at 7:30 a.m., in Dallas, Texas. The early-morning photo was taken for a depth-of-field photography project, capturing Kilroy in sharp focus while the background and foreground fade softly out of view. (Photo by Johnny Crowley)

When I initially started off on this depth-of-field assignment, I have to admit, I thought it would be easy. I figured I'd click a quick shot, blur the background, and be done. But when I finally tried to get the shot, I discovered that it was far harder than I imagined. Getting one part of the picture in focus, while the other is blurred is not something you just happen to do by accident it takes a lot of fiddling around, patience, and experimentation.

The goal was to photograph Quinn Kilroy sitting down to eat at the breakfast table inside the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity house, where he was sharp and the foreground and background were fuzzy. That sounded simple enough, but it was frustrating at first because nothing was coming out quite as I pictured it. Either too much of the image was in focus, or none of it was. It's then that I realized how crucial aperture really was and how much control it has over depth-of-field.

Adjusting the aperture proved to be the most challenging aspect of the project., Every time I adjusted it, something else within the image would change too. If I made it too small, everything within the image remained clear and intrusive. If I had it open too wide, the light would be too harsh or the image would lose the depth that I was trying to achieve. It was as if I was adjusting and adjusting all the time to nail the area where Quinn was in focus, but everything else would soften and fade into the background.

There were other challenges too. The breakfast table was messy, and the sun through the windows kept shifting, which made it all the harder to get a clean shot. I had to get into position, try different angles, and just keep taking pictures until something came together the way I wanted it to. It was definitely frustrating at times, but the more I practiced and learned about the camera and how the settings affected one another, the better I got.

Before I even received the shot that I actually ended up using, I discovered I had learned more from this project than I had expected. It wasn't necessarily about taking the picture — it was about learning how to use the camera and how much you get to control what the final result is. Knowing how to use aperture to control depth-of-field made me feel more in control of my photography, and seeing the finished picture with Quinn in sharp focus made all the struggle worth it.