What Is A Bokeh Pano?
A “Bokeh Pano” is a stitched panorama, made up from shallow depth of field photos. Taken on a longer (focal length) lens with a large entrance pupil.
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Bokeh = A pleasing blur, or ‘out-of-focus’ rendering
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Pano / Panorama = Stitched images emulating a wider angle of view
Tip: To assure impressive subject isolation; Get as close to your subject as possible, while keeping as much distance behind it (subject to background). Combine this with using a lens that has a large entrance pupil.
Trick: This technique can allow relatively budget equipment to emulate cameras and/or lenses that (if they existed) would be prohibitively large, heavy & expensive.
Why?
Using this technique enables you to combine wide angles with extremely shallow depth of field. This isolation can highlight your subject (usually a specific part of it) whilst keeping more context of your scene.
How?
A batch of generously overlapping images (usually multiple rows) are taken of a scene, from the same position. Software then analyses elements from each frame to align the batch automatically.
When?
Since it can take a while to shoot the whole batch of images for your panorama, there are some points to consider when it comes to planning your shoot. The limitations can seem severe, but the benefits can be so impressive that it’s worth trying to work around them.
Benefits
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Emulating Impossibly Large Lenses
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Ultimate Subject Isolation
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Extreme Image Quality
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Budget lenses achieving extreme results
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Drastically Reduced Noise (see below)
Limitations
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Mostly For Static subjects (or that can stay still)
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Mostly for smallish subjects and close focusing
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Large Learning Curve (hopefully this guide can help)
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Time Consuming & Challenging Process (Workflow)
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Partially Overcast (changeable) lighting problematic
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Direct Sunlight Problematic (shutter speed limits)
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Possible Extra Gear Needed (due to higher workload)
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May Inspire GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome)
Quick Start Guide
I am pretty impatient, so I understand not wanting to wade through pages of text to start seeing results. Experimenting with photography can be fun, so if you just want to get started - this section is for you...
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Choose your equipment (this might help)
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Choose a subject (preferably <5m in size)
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Find a pleasing background (BG)
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Get distance between your subject & BG
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Get close to your subject
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Find a comfortable & stable position
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Visualise your final frame
Settings
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Lock focus on your subject
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Turn autofocus off
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Set camera exposure to "Manual"
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Set the aperture to widest (lowest f-stop)
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Set shutter speed (consider whole frame)
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Set manual ISO value
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Set White Balance (unless using RAW)
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Turn IS on in low light (if you have it)
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Decide how to move between shots
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Shoot images with around 50% overlap
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Attempt to pivot around the nodal point, or...
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Use nodal head tripod to assure rotation
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Make sure to cover the corners (final frame)
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Try to hold still between shots
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Remove vignetting (if possible)
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Process the batch of images
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Output result from the stitching software
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Crop
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Add vignetting
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Fine-tune the colours (if needed)
How much can you emulate?
The bokeh pano below was stitched from 44 photos, taken using a 135mm f/1.8 lens on a full frame camera. Which full frame camera would make little difference. I will talk about this more in the next section, but the lens is by far the most important element of this technique. As you can probably see by the frame guides, this entire image is somewhere between 4x5" and 8x10" in size.
