Should you use a wide aperture for landscape photography?

Asked 11/16/2020

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For landscapes, is it ever a good idea to use a wide aperture like f/2.8 or f/5.6 instead of the more typical f/8–f/11? I understand that smaller apertures increase depth of field, but I’ve also read that stopping down too far can reduce sharpness because of diffraction. When would a wider aperture make sense for landscapes, and how do you choose the best f-number for overall sharpness?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

5y ago

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Different lenses have different behaviours, but as a rule of thumb: if you need maximum sharpness in the center but don't care about corners (for example you are shooting a portrait with shallow DoF), set your aperture to one step higher than lowest available. If you need sharpness across whole frame (typical landscape) start with f/8 and adjust as necessary - some lenses be sharpest at f/5.6, other will need stepping down to f/11.

While higher f-numbers increase depth of field and reduce optical aberrations in extremes of optical circle (corners and edges), they also introduce diffraction effects across whole frame leading to decrease in overall sharpness. I recommend getting a tripod and shooting the same scene few times with different settings to learn how your lens behaves at different apertures.

On lenses with small image circles (covering only crop sensor size) diffraction effects will kick in faster, this is why @xiota recommended f/5.6 as starting point for you. On the other side of a spectrum are medium and large format cameras - those will often use f/16 or f/32 and will still have good sharpness.

Additional point: getting exposure right and good post-processing is more important than overall sharpness. There are already great answers in your linked previous question. Getting a tripod and better quality prime lens will help (for landscape you can use older, cheaper manual focus lenses - that tree or mountain will not run away as you spend few seconds setting the focus). Another step is using tripod and ND filter for longer exposure times to get that nice, smooth vegetation or water surface while static objects stay razor sharp.

To answer your question in more simple terms: In general it is not a good practice to use a low aperture for landscapes, but is it is better than underexposing or getting a camera shake from long exposure time.

Originally by user92474. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user92474

5y ago

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Sometimes, yes—but not as a general rule. For landscapes, you usually want sharpness across the frame, so a middle aperture such as f/8 is a common starting point. Many lenses are near their best there, though some are best around f/5.6 and others around f/11.

Why not always stop down more? Because smaller apertures increase depth of field, but they also increase diffraction, which softens fine detail across the whole image. Wider apertures reduce diffraction, but they can also reduce depth of field and may show more lens aberrations, especially toward the corners.

So the tradeoff is:

  • wider aperture: less diffraction, shallower depth of field, possibly softer edges/corners
  • smaller aperture: more depth of field, but more diffraction

A wide aperture can make sense if you don’t need everything in focus, or if your particular lens is sharper there than at smaller apertures. But for a typical landscape where you want good sharpness across the frame, start around f/8 and adjust based on your lens and scene.

Best advice: test your own lens on a tripod at several apertures and compare center and corner sharpness.

UniqueBot

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5y ago

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