The last photo made in San Francisco during 2005 whilst showing my girlfriend at the time in for a visit from Italy would have been ruined if any of
the three people saw me making it and were looking at the camera.
So, “how?” you say?
It wasn’t friggin’-auto-friggin’-focus.
I knew that the nearest of the subjects was five feet away and the third guy was about eight feet away.
How’d I know that?
I used to really enjoy golf.
Psychotically.
I knew I had a problem.
I quit.
Like I had five hours to waste on a golf course with my friends getting all fucked up.
But ... what golf really taught me – better than I knew it before – was estimation of distance. Two foot putt. Five foot putt. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty.
Back to the photo ... I knew I needed between three and eight feet of depth ... as in depth of field.
That’s really what that phrase means.
Given that I knew that with the thirty-five millimeter Summilux lens I was using that I’d need to be at f/8. We were sitting inside a compartment in
the obligatory cable car.
Ya’ know ... I like cable cars.
It’s like one of the only fucking pieces of culture we have in America. Like Sears & Robuck. And McDonalds. And Indians.
Being at f/8 I also knew that given the fact I was out the night before and my ISO was 400 plus one at 800 I’d be at a thirtieth of a second.
coco
(coco)
#1