Thank you PortAndLemon, that is really useful - I will have a play today.

At the very least, you want a camera that either (a) has various modes including a "portrait" mode, or (b) allows you to control the aperture yourself.

You want to put the camera in "portrait" mode or set the aperture pretty wide as you can (the smaller the number, the wider the aperture, just to confuse you - aim for f4 at least, and wider if possible, especially if you are using a compact camera).

Then also have it zoomed in as far as its optical zoom will zoom (don't bother with the digital zoom) and move further away to get the subject framed the way you want.

Also try to keep your subject a reasonable distance away from the background. The greater the distance between them, the easier it will be to get the background out of focus but the subject sharp.

You will get better results with a digital SLR, because compact digital cameras always have a greater depth of field (i.e. have more in focus). But with care you can get OK results from a compact camera.

If all else fails, you can enhance the out-of-focus blur in Photoshop, but getting a quality result that way takes a reasonable amount of work.

Not sure if this is the right topic...

Does anyone know how to take a photo with a digital camera that only has the subject in focus and everything else blurred?

We've been sent a pic of our dd that someone else took and it is gorgeous, but what makes it extra special is that she is the only thing in focus. I know it was taken on an SLR camera. Do I need one of these or can you do it on a bog standard digital camera?