Hah, typing right on top of each other Ash!

As Ash and Chris have pointed out, getting shallow DOF on miniature objects is a piece of cake.

I will say that I've been quite happy with what I can get with human subjects as well. I had one shot where the camera as 8 feet away from a person, the wall behind them was another 6 feet back, and framed for a CU I was able to get very nice shallow DOF. Easier to get than it was with my DVX100, for sure.

In general, to get shallow DOF, back up, zoom in, open iris wide.

That makes me want to build a model train set just so I can film it blowing up!

Maybe you could do that with your son's set? :p

Actually, he's seven and he'd be totally up for it. His other main hobbies are crashing planes in Microsoft flight simulator and crashing trains in Microsoft train simulator. And all of his model train setups involve fires or disasters of some sort.

Man, I never grew out of that stage... I still enjoy destroying things, like a huge city in SimCity

The XL H1 is simply amazing at every level. Makes me frown upon my XL1s :(

Maybe you can destroy your XL1s to give you a reason to buy the H1? I'm considering doing the same with my XL2 :p

Maybe you can first get an H1 and then film yourself destroying your XL1.

Now THERE'S the solution! I can fulfill my satisfaction of destroying something beautiful, and get the H1.... hmm

I will say, that getting that great DOF can be easy in a filmic scene, where you can move way across the room. To get it in an interview setting is MUCH tougher. I interviewed my brother to test the XL2 and got amazing DOF when zoomed in at 18 or 20x. Of course, I was half way across his back yard and practically yelling him questions. He asked, "Are most interviews done like this?" I didn't get into a DOF conversation with him. :-)

kW

It's not just a factor of him being far enough away to use the .long end of the lens.
You can shoot considerably closer but need to have a background that is far enough away from the subject to get shallow DOF.
For instance sooting outside, with the subject 15 feet away but the background of a treeline or fence line etc, perhaps 100' away.
You can get reasonably shallow DOF with a traditional wide CU if you're tight, with wide aperature and a distant background as well.