In some cases, you may desire to take bokeh photography to help you to express motion or make the subject more fairy. There are many ways for you to get bokeh photography effect to create a shallow depth of field and have beams of light in the background. It is not hard for you to fix how to do bokeh photography with the assistance of this tutorial. Read the content in this bokeh photography tutorial and get out there to create bokeh easily.


Part 1: What is Bokeh Photography?

what-is-bokeh-photography-1

You may have encountered the term bokeh before if you have photographer friends or visit photography websites frequently. This optical effect is a hot topic among camera enthusiasts. However, what is bokeh photography exactly?

Bokeh is one word that originates from the Japanese word boke, whose meaning is “blur”. There are many photographers who are fond of bokeh photography effect, for the visually pleasing qualities it create. Photographers can not only get a blurry backdrop to draw attention to the subject but also can obtain the dreamy and eye-catching effects. Bokeh is a pretty effect of a soft defocused background, which can help photographers to gain an artistic result with an extraordinary plot. The bokeh photography effect can vary from pentagons to blurry circles. The bokeh photography skill is quite characteristic.

Part 2: 5 Best Bokeh Photography Tips

As for how to do bokeh photography, there are 5 tips that I would like to share with you. You can make use of these bokeh photography tips to create great effects to fit your demands.

1# Choose proper lens and set suitable aperture

The lens for bokeh photography effect play an important role. The lens applied when shooting can determine the shape and size of the visible bokeh part. The shape of the aperture of the lens can affect the bokeh effect to a great degree. Proper lens for bokeh photography effect will have rounder, softer orbs of out-of-focus highlights, which can create more circular shaped blades.

If the aperture of a lens is more hexagonal in shape, the lens will reflect that shape in highlights. You can increase the distance between the background and the subject to shoot with smaller apertures like f/8 to gain the bokeh effect in images. This is just the example and you need to consider the actual subject and environment you desire to shoot when set the aperture.

5-best-bokeh-photography-tips-lens-2

2# Select appropriate background

To deal with how to do bokeh photography, you also need to pay attention to the background you choose. It is crucial to choose the right one. If the background is plain, it is hard for you to get good bokeh effect, for there is nothing much going on in the scene. For pretty bokeh photography, particular elements like light orbs or soft textures and patterns should show prominently in the photo. Urban locations are thought to be the perfect places for taking images with bokeh effect, for the lights from buildings and streets offer wonderful visual components for your photo background. The light reflecting on bodies of water can also produce attractive boken effects. You can see the photo below to comprehend the importance of light when shooting boken photography.

5-best-bokeh-photography-tips-background-3

3# Determine subject and focus on the subject well

It is sensible for you to choose proper subject to ensure the theme as natural as possible. For instance, you can define your subject as a leaf that mixed nicely with the field in terms of shape and complimentary colors.

After you determine the subject, you then need to focus on it. You’d better illuminate your subject adequately to create beautiful bokeh effects. Meter your subject and focus on it. Thus, your camera will adjust the exposure accordingly to assist you to get great bokeh photos with better exposure. To focus on your subject properly will facilitate you to get better bokeh effect. This calls for practice and you need to insist on shooting.

5-best-bokeh-photography-tips-subject-4

4# Get close to the subject

You are recommended to get as close as possible to the subject you desire to shoot. When you are much closer to the subject of the photo, the depth of field will become shallower, and the more blurry your background will become as well. For shooting bokeh photos, you need also make sure your focus is closer to the camera. Thus, more bokeh effects will appear with the help of the algorithm of increasing the distance between the model and its background.

5-best-bokeh-photography-tips-close-5

5# Apple the AV mode of your camera

It is sensible for you to set your camera to AV mode, which is also known as Aperture Priority. This is quite proper for new photographers to achieve the bokeh effects. The AV mode setting allows you to select the aperture and help you to set the shutter speed automatically. There is no need for you to consider the exposure, which can save you much time. It is quite convenient for you to make use of the AV mode and you’d better pay attention to this mode when you buy one new camera, for some old types of cameras do not have this feature.

5-best-bokeh-photography-tips-av-6

The five tips mentioned in the above can help you get better boken photography. You can have a try when you need to shoot bokeh photos. It calls for practicing to grasp these tips. As a matter of fact, you are not satisfied with your bokeh photography in many cases. For improving the photo effect, you can resort to a good photo enhancer to make it. Read on and you will learn how to use a great image enhancer to get this work done perfectly.

Part 3: How to Enhance Photos with Bokeh Photography Effect with Leawo PhotoIns?

Although there are many skills and tips for you to learn to get good bokeh photography effect, it is not easy to grasp these skills in a day, which is much harder for beginners. In order to assist photographers to enhance photos with bokeh photography effect that is not good enough, here I would like to recommend you to use Leawo PhotoIns to enhance your photo quality. This software is a powerful AI photo enhancer, which can improve your photo effect automatically in various aspects, including bokeh effect, sharpness, white balance and etc. with just a few clicks. It is also a good idea to fix photo issues such as exposure, colors and so forth. Follow the step-by-step instruction below and you will know how to use this program to gain photos with better bokeh effects.

Step 1. Download and Install Leawo PhotoIns

Go to the official website of Leawo PhotoIns to download this powerful bokeh photography enhancer freely. Install it on your computer to prepare for photo enhancement.

  • photoins
  • Leawo PhotoIns

    - Enhance portrait photos easily with advanced AI technology
    - Fix photo exposure and white balance issues automatically
    - Optimize photo colors and perfect photo tints
    - Make photos perfectly clear with smart dehaze
    - Boost photo lighting and color quality
    - Process RAW and JPG files

Step 2. Add Photos with Bokeh Photography Effect

Fire up Leawo PhotoIns after you install it successfully. Hit on the button of “Add Photo” to import images with bokeh effect into the tool. Alternatively, you can also directly drag and drop your source pictures with bokeh effect into the software for enhancement.

how-to-enhance-photos-with-bokeh-photography-effect-with-leawo-photoins-add-7

Step 3. Enhance Bokeh Pictures Effect

You can choose to enhance your bokeh photos one by one or in batch. To enhance images one by one, you need to double click on an image to call out the interface to preview. The tool will begin to identify and enhance your photo with bokeh effect automatically to fix various issues in the image. The software allows you to drag the effect adjuster bar right below the preview window to the left or to the right to obtain the suitable effect that you desire to apply. You can check out the adjusted effect before and after to decide which effect you would like to use.

how-to-enhance-photos-with-bokeh-photography-effect-with-leawo-photoins-preview-8

Step 4. Output the Enhanced Photos with Bokeh Effect

After the enhancement is finished, you can hit on the output button at the bottom right. The “Output settings” window will show up, and here you can set output position, output format, quality and other settings for your photos. And then click the blue “Output (1) photo” button to output the enhanced image with bokeh effect.

how-to-enhance-photos-with-bokeh-photography-effect-with-leawo-photoins-set-9

You can also click on the “Output” button at the bottom right corner of the photos you load to the program and then hit on “Output * photos” to enhance your source bokeh photos in batch.

how-to-enhance-photos-with-bokeh-photography-effect-with-leawo-photoins-output-10

To sum up, there are many photographers would like to take bokeh photos for various cases. It is a great idea to grasp photography skills to get good bokeh effect. If this is not what you are good at, you can use Leawo PhotoIns to help you improve photo effect to meet your demand to a great degree.