How to animate Depth of Field?

[paulostorch]

hey guys, can you help me?

I would like to animate the focus and blur of an object in my scene as if, in real life and with a real camera, I were adjusting the focus of my lens manually. Example: at the beginning of the animation, the object is out of focus, and as the animation runs, the object appears in focus. I've tried using keyframes, placing the camera target at a point far from the object in the first key, and at another point closer to the object in the last key, but without success. Any tips on how I can achieve this?

thanks!

[romullus]

Does the camera target moves when you scrub the timeline? Maybe you forgot to create keyframes? Also check if focus is not overridden in camera settings. Otherwise it should work as you described - animating camera target will animate focal plane.

[TomG]

You can also tell a camera to use an object as the focal distance. This can be e.g. part of a moving car so the car is always in focus without you doing a thing, or it could be a null object that doesn't render but which you can keyframe at your leisure to control just what is in focus and what is not.