

Notice how effectively it changes the shot's Field of View (FOV) as the focal length increases, the FOV decreases. You can think of the focal length as being similar to zooming in with a camera, except when doing so, the the out-of-focus areas of the shot in the background and foreground are becoming more pronounced. In the example below, you can see this when changing between a focal length of 50mm and 100mm the shot appears mostly in focus throughout the foreground but when using 100mm focal length, it's easier to see that the background is more out of focus and the foreground has a minimal amount of blur too. To demonstrate how this works, drag the slider to change the Lens Focal Length to be between 50mm, 75mm, and 100mm. The Focal Length is the distance from the center of the lens to the Filmback (or image sensor) measured in millimeters (mm). However, in UE4, this is not a real camera, so adjusting the F-stop and Diaphragm does not control the light intensity. Normally when you would adjust the Aperture settings of a real camera, you'd have to also adjust the Exposure settings at the same time to maintain same light intensity received by the filmback/image sensor. Larger F-stops increase the depth of DOF with less blur. Smaller F-stop numbers create a shallower DOF with more background and foreground blur. To demonstrate how the Aperture works, drag the slider to change the F-stop number between 1.4, 2.8, and 5.6. See Focus Distance for a diagram showing this effect. The lens Aperture is defined by the diameter of the Diaphragm which decreases as the F-stop number increases controlling how shallow or deep the depth of field effect is. It opens and closes based on the supplied F-stop. The Diaphragm is the mechanical structure made up of multiple blades used to block light. The Aperture is defined by Focal Length divided by an F-stop number. The Aperture is the diameter of the opening through which light passes. There are two elements that make up the Aperture the F-stop number and the Diaphragm. The size of the Aperture (or f-stop number) sets how much light passes through the Lens in turn controlling how much the foreground and background is blurred based on the Focus Distance of the shot. This diagram demonstrates the Diaphragm (2) blocking light passing through the Lens (1). Lens Aperture Diaphragm measured in F-stop The Aperture defines how sharp or blurred the foreground and background are based on the diameter of the Diaphragm which is controlled in f-stop. The Aperture (4) defines how blurred objects in the foreground and background will be that is not in focus, and, finally, the Focal Length (5) of the lens controls the field of view, or how zoomed in the image will be. Here we have the multiple points (1) representing objects captured by the camera to a defined Focus Distance (2), in this case, the blue subject. Red is part of the background and more out of focus, Green is part of the foreground and marginally out of focus. Take note that the rendered image on the right is inverted through the camera lens. This method uses a procedural Bokeh simulation that provides dynamic resolution stability and alpha channel support while being faster, scalable, and optimized for projects developing on desktop and consoles. The following depth of field methods provides a cinematic look that closely resembles photography and film for desktop and console platforms using the Deferred Shading renderer and Clustered Forward renderer.Ĭinematic DOF closely matches real-world cameras, similarly to Circle and Bokeh DOF, you can see circular shaped Bokeh (out-of-focus areas) with sharp High Dynamic Range (HDR) content. Useful Console Variables for Optimization
