Kubrick's f0.75 Zeiss in Barry Lyndon

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richg101

Well-known member
Well documented is Kubricks use of a modified Zeiss Planar 50mm f0.75 for candle lit scenes. What I don't understand is how they achieved such deep depth of focus while shooting at such wide apertures? the first dark candle lit scene (in the dutch womans cottage) is lovely and soft-suggesting a very wide aperture, yet the background is still a lot more in focus than I would have expected from such a wide aperture. Could it be that the camera was positioned far enough away (i am assuming more than 10 meters), using magnifying diopters/or cropping in order for the characters to still fill the frame?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJahPDkvivc

cheers
 
For that lens they made Kubrick a couple of focal converters that screwed onto the front. I believe the two choices made for a 35mm and an 85mm, so something quite close to that. But most of what I saw in the scene looked to be the 50mm.
 
im assuming it was wide open (based on the effort they went to in order to modify the lens for use in the film). how do you think they achieved such a deep depth of focus? both the table front, candles and the characters are all pretty much in focus. the background isnt that out of focus either
 
Have you watched this on a large screen? I think the small size of YouTube is making everything seem sharper. The table, candles, and background are all out of focus.
 
good point. though my initial queries were raised during watching the blue ray of barry lyndon on a 50" plasma. i still thought that the depth of focus would have been shallower than we see here
 
No, it looks about right to me. Kubrick knew that he was going to end up with very shallow focus, so he made the sets fairly shallow. The rear wall isn't that far behind and the table is very short. Your brain makes you expect that the physical depth is greater because that's what you presume it to be, which is what Kubrick banked on. It's an aspect of forced perspective.
 
nice. now lookin at it, the bed is against the wall, when at first glance it doesnt look that way. the set is a lot shallower than i thought. cheers
 
richg101 said:
im assuming it was wide open (based on the effort they went to in order to modify the lens for use in the film). how do you think they achieved such a deep depth of focus? both the table front, candles and the characters are all pretty much in focus. the background isnt that out of focus either
Click to expand...

While the 'famous' scene is the one everyone remembers seems 'sharper', I watched a few minutes of "Barry Lyndon"(1975) just to refresh my memory. In an early scene, where Barry and Captain Gorgan are talking and lit by candle light:

barrylyndon-barry.jpg


While this small picture does not show it well, but visible on the glint of the buttons... there is very shallow DoF... and the shots of Captain Gorgan are more obvious.
 
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