Brandenburg Gate before the wall

This rare photo of the Brandenburg Gate after the border was closed, but before the wall was built disproves depth-of-field rules and displays the effects of placing the exact plane of focus (the focal-plane) on the most important image point in a photo:

The focal plane is exactly on the sign the center saying "Attention! You are now leaving West Berlin". That sign stands out almost like a three-dimensional cartoon in the photo and inexorably draws the viewer's eye to itself.

Cover the sign and the rest of the photo looks unsharp and flat (two-dimensional). Uncover the sign and its sharpness and plasticity (effect of three-dimensionality on a two dimensional surface) lends the effect of sharpness to the whole rest of the photo!

That is definitely NOT how the photo industry says depth of field works.

The photo of the Radio City statue in Rockeffeler center ((http://anstendig.com/Messraster/radio_city.html) proves that depth of field relationships do not work as believed, because, in that photo, the focus is quite correctly all the way to the front of the scene and the photo looks sharp, even though the rest of the photo is not really sharp and depth of field would have you place the focus about 1/3rd from the front and 2/3rds from the back.

Messraster Index

Click on the Gallery to see the full list of categories.