Lens settings? How to change focal point (in an animation) Tweet

[orion_uk]

Hi, I see that when rendering a still image you can change the focal value, I cant work out how to do the following when rendering an animation and would love some advice please?

I have a scene setup (Daz Genesis via collada) with the camera tracking an EMPTY as a target. The target is in front of my characters face and the camera moves around the character targeting the EMPTY during the whole animation. In Blender I have another EMPTY (I named it focal node) that is selected under camera settings as the focal `object`as I cant track the face in Blender, (I only get options for armatures or other objects, not sub objects of the armature!) So how do I change focal distance during an animation in blender & Octane Render? So far all i have come up with is a clear view of my characters eye with the rest of the scene all blurry

I would like EVERYTHING in my scene to remain in focus for a large part of the animation and then the focal point (EMPTY/focal node) to move near the end of the animation so the character goes out of focus?

I am currently rendering a test of the EMPTY/focal node moving from one character to the other to see what happens, i simply want to learn how to focus on once character for a set time then shift focus on to another!

Also, how do you keep everything in the scene in focus during an animation (No problem with stills as I simply change OR camera settings rather than Blender settings), my attempts are so blurry unless I am working on a still image I cant achieve a clear picture! Man, I got so much to learn

Many thanks for reading

UPDATE:

I think I am getting the hang of this a bit now, but I could still do with some pointers plz?
I just cant get the point I want to focus on nice and clear! I guess I find it hard to gauge where the blur starts and where it ends in the scene and how much of the area/scene will be clear or blurry!

[ROUBAL]

I have done very few animations so far in Octane because I mainly make big scenes and the export/load time is huge. This said, in Blender you have to use the Defocus node with your Empty to adjust the focus on the Empty distance. Then animate the Empty.

If you want everything in focus, dont use the Defocus node and Empty, and select Autofocus in Octane's Camera parameters.

If you don't use autofocus and want some DOF :
If you have very few DOF, check your aperture parameter. Put it at Zero for max DOF (neat at all distances).

[orion_uk]

Hi Roubal, Thanks for your helpful reply

I think I am getting it now (Thanks to you) but need to `play about` a bit more to strengthen my understanding of the process

Dont blink or you will miss the change in focus (from hand to face & back to hand) but here is a sample of my success, Thank again for your advice



Now I have a better understanding of the process I am going to look at adding detail to the scene, more character animation and focus (if you will pardon the pun) on smoother transitions between focal points and a longer animation. I will post the results here when its rendered

Thank you so much for taking the time to help me, v-kind of you