With a digital point and shoot camera can I focus on one point and leave the rest blurred or do I need an SLR?

I want to be able to focus on something in the foreground and leave the background blurred and vice - versa.

Look at your manual, all the new, fancy digitals can do exactly the same as SLR's

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Most digi cams have an auto focus at the first press of the shutter release. If you focus on a closer or further object then without letting the button go move the cam to where you want and take the pic

the cheapo digital cameras won't, i like creating this effect myself afterwards with PaintShopPro

you dont say what camera, if you mean the small compact point and shoot cameras then they all have af (autofocus) which will put into sharp focus the main object. It can work the other way round too, if something is too near for the autofocus it will sharpen the background and blur the nearest. The results are not as good as with a larger camera but for ordinary stuff the af with sharp foreground is more than adequate.

Normally point and shoot cameras don't allow that flexibility but it does depend on what kind of camera you have and which model. Check out the manual or look at the website of the make of your camera for any tips on your model. I've found that digital cameras that have the capability of switching to a manaual focus mode do a pretty good job at focusing on one area and blurring out the other. If your camera does not have a manual mode then you will not likely be able to do this. But read the manual just to be sure. Otherwise you can do it another way by editing your photo using a program such as Photoshop. Photoshop lets you 'select' a part of an image and then blur out the rest. The downside is Photoshop is an expensive program. Good Luck!

you probably need an SLR, the blurred background is to do with "depth of field" which relates to the size of the aperture, point and shoots generally don't have that much leeway. You might be able to fiddle with the settings on the point of shoot to get some kind of blur effect. For instance, using a night setting at daytime...

You could maybe take the photo and do the blurring in an image editing package.

Some have got menu features, Portrait springs to mind, I expect it uses a larger aperture. But if you want full control an slr or a fully featured digital camera would do the job. I have an Olympus 5050 which has shutter or aperture priority as well as programmed setting and normal auto. The current models are better and cheaper

The one person who answered above is right. You aim at something and press down the button half way, wait until small little boxes appear (on a canon). The camera is now focused on that object at that distance. this is the item that will be in focus. If you move the camera to another place, the camera will still try to focus on that distance. Then press completely down and shoot the picture

You will need to experiment. The good thing is you don't have to pay for developing while you make mistakes