How the Lytro Camera Works
Imagine you’ve set up a shot in which a tree branch is in the foreground and a person is posed in the background. You adjust your camera’s settings so that the person in the background is in focus. The tree branch in the foreground isn’t in focus, creating what you hope is an artistic image. You snap the photo.
Later, as you gaze upon your masterpiece, you have a nagging doubt in your mind. Maybe it would have been better to focus on the tree branch instead of the person posed in the background. Perhaps the ambiguity would have made the picture more intriguing. But you’ll never know, because you can’t alter the focus on a picture you’ve already taken.
The Lytro camera addresses this problem. It uses special lenses and sensors to capture all the light fields within the scope of a scene. When you take a picture with a Lytro camera, you’re just getting started. With special software, included when you purchase the camera, you can adjust the focal point of the image after you’ve already taken it. Switching from a foreground to background focus only takes a touch of your finger or click of a mouse.
