Another beginner’s tip for you today. Blurry backgrounds.

How do you get blurry backgrounds? Any of the following:

1. Larger aperture (“lower f-number”).
2. Zoom in.
3. Get closer.

Do not forget numbers 2 and 3. Take this picture, taken at f/4:

That’s a nice blurry background. But if we want it blurrier, we can, as one of the options, simply get closer. The very same settings (same lens, same everything; f/4, again, but closer), give us this:

See how much blurrier the background is? So if you cannot afford an f/1.4 lens, then just get closer.

Another thing you notice, perhaps, in picture two: it’s simpler. Simplify! As Antoine de Saint-Exupery said: “we achieve perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away”.