The purpose of your camera's portrait mode is to tell your camera that your subject is a portrait. In essence what the camera does is to narrow the area that is in focus, or Dept of Field . The end result is that distracting backgrounds and foregrounds are softened so that your subject is more emphasized. It does this by opening the aperature and possibly using a faster shutter speed.

This mode uses depth of field as a premise for reducing the area that is in focus. The background and foreground become softer and your subject is emphasized. The mechanics behind this mode are a larger aperture and faster shutter speed.

Exercise: Using Portrait Mode.

Part I

1. Working outside or in a brightly lit area pick a subject with a noisy background.
2. Place your camera in Automatic Mode
3. From about 6 feet away compose your subject and include some of the background and foreground in the picture.
   Because depth of field is affected by distance as well as f-stop, you will find that a background farther away from the subject will have better and more noticeable results.
4. Take the first shot and check it. Your subject should be sharp, and the background will probably be sharp too.
5. Now re-set your camera to the portrait mode and take the same picture with the same composition. Your subject should again be sharp. In the second shot the background should not be as sharp and should take less from the picture.
6. While gaining an understanding of the portrait mode you should also repeat the test by moving in closer to the subject and then moving farther away. Keep the same composition as much as possible. You will also see other changes that affect your subject.
   
   With this additional testing you will understand how focal length will also affect the depth of field. If you are using a point and shoot camera you may not see as dramatic a results as you will with a SLR camera. The reason for this is that point and shoot cameras usually have wide angle lens and these lens have a greater depth of field.

Part II

Now let's take this another step. In a prior example you were testing your flash and changed the ISO setting of the camera. If your camera will let you change your ISO in portrait mode try repeating the shots of your subject with ISO 100 and then ISO 500. Look at the pictures to see what changed.

If your camera will not let you change the ISO try these steps:

1. Switch to the Time or TV mode. Set the time to 30th of a second. Set the ISO to 100.
2. Pick an outdoor well lit scene with no bright spots behind the subject.
3. Take a picture.
4. Change the ISO to 400.
5. Take a picture
6. Change the ISO to 800.
7. Take a picture.

If all works with your camera as expected you will see that the background becomes more in focus the higher the ISO. This can be handy if the background is an important part of the image.

 

 

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