Q&A: How Do I Make a Fence Disappear?
I remember reading once how to shoot a photo through a cyclone fence so that the fence "disappears." Unfortunately, that's all I remember. Do you know how to accomplish this little trick? It's surprising how often you find yourself behind a fence that would spoil the shot.
--Bob Russell, Colorado Springs, Colorado
While I'm no magician, I do make fences disappear from pictures on occasion, Bob. I do that by blurring the fence into oblivion.
The trick is that you need to be very close to the fence when you take the picture. Get as close as physically possible and focus on something that is a significant distance away on the other side of the fence--the farther, the better. If you focus on something that's only a couple of feet away, this trick probably won't work since the fence will be in the field of focus. And finally, it helps if you can shoot with a wide-open aperture, like f/2 or f/4. By combining these elements--get the camera close to the fence, focus far away, and shoot with a small f stop--you can blur the fence so much that it doesn't appear in the picture.
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