bokeh as a deciding factor

[gavinlg]

Bokeh isn't particularly equipment centric, it's also hugely about the result - you cannot possibly argue that different lenses will give different looks, and that it is in a photographers best interest to know his equipment, where it's strengths and weaknesses lie in the same way a surveyor would know his equipment, or a formula 1 driver would know how his car reacts in every situation. It is not a sin nor a crime for a photographer to discuss or hold opinions on certain aspects of his or her gear - and bokeh is an aspect of lens rendering - that in itself is fact. You cannot deny that different lenses and conditions will produce unique "out of focus" looks or "bokeh" (for what I think is a much better term), in the same way different lenses have unique levels of sharpness or color rendering (for instance, generally sigma renders warm and zeiss renders cool).

A picture is not just a picture - the more control you have over your gear and how it reacts or works in situations the better. By finding out what sort of lenses you may like, and how the rendering abilities of a lens react in certain situations, you are more in control, more aware of how to bring out the best in photographic situations.

Lens characteristics include -
sharpness
-color rendering
-out of focus characteristics or BOKEH
-flare/ghosting resistance
-how lights are handled at night (for instance the more aperture blades the lens has, the more points to the star of a street light when the lens is stopped down)
-contrast/micro contrast
-distortion
Vignetting
+ so many more


Together, the form an overall look unique to that lens.

If you're going to try and say that bokeh doesn't matter or exist, you may as well say that sharpness or flare resistance doesn't exist, or that it doesn't matter if the lens renders everything completely yellow, or if the distortion looks like the handlebars on a harley. You may as well be shooting everything with a holga. Imagine the big commercial company that hires you to shoot their new multi million dollar product, and you end up with a picture with sever vignetting, mushy sharpness, a little flare spot and a light leak halfway up the frame.

You could say that a formula 1 driver need not know how a hydraulic brake booster works, or how ABS and traction control is helping him stop better or get traction - but it's in his BEST interest to know that stuff if he wants to use his car to its maximum potential.

 

[BillP]

Dear Fred,

I'd postulate the exact opposite viewpoint: the vast majority understands very well what d-o-f is, viz., the difference between what is acceptably sharp and what isn't. The real disputes come in (a) what constitutes 'acceptable' and (b) how much each individual cares.

By the same token, I'd suggest that most people have at least some awareness of QOFI (the Quality of the Out of Focus Image, vulgarly known as 'bokeh' and most clearly seen with mirror-lens 'doughnuts') but that again, the big difference is how much they (a) notice and (b) care.

Cheers,

Roger

Good points.

I'd postulate that the novice (these days) starts with an either-or view of focus driven by the equipment they start out with.

The depth of focus on small sensor digitals is huge. Only occasionally will they encounter something where the main subject is not in focus - the proverbial focussing on the landscape between two people springs to mind. Please humour me if I call this the first level of photographic sophistication.

The concept of deliberately using differential focussing to emphasise one element of your image requires both a more sophisticated understanding of what is going on and also most likely more sophisticated equipment than the p/s or mobile phone that is the start point. Let's peg this as the second level of sophistication.

The third level comes when you go out of your way to use differential focussing creatively with equal emphasis on both the plane of focus and the area out of focus. This in turn could be "passive" - the unconscious choosing of an uncluttered background to make the main subject "pop" without competition from other distracting elements - or "active" - the positioning of an out of focus parent behind an in-focus child, for instance.

This, I believe, is the path to enlightenment. Bokeh is just a word to tag a concept.

Regards,

Bill

 

[Roger Hicks]

Together, they form an overall look unique to that lens.

Dear Gavin,

You might very well think that. I might very well think that. Professional lens designers (I've met a few, and discussed 'look' with them) might very well think that.

But what do we know, next to experts?

Cheers,

R.

 

[Roger Hicks]

The third level comes when you go out of your way to use differential focussing creatively with equal emphasis on both the plane of focus and the area out of focus. This in turn could be "passive" - the unconscious choosing of an uncluttered background to make the main subject "pop" without competition from other distracting elements - or "active" - the positioning of an out of focus parent behind an in-focus child, for instance.

Dear Bill,

A nice analysis. Thanks.

Cheers,

Roger

 

[tripod]

I can understan backalley's position that bokeh is not a significant consideration for him in his photography, but not nikonwebmaster's position that since he doesn't understand, or believe in, or know, whatever, what bokeh is, anyone who does consider it significant is being foolish.

 

[BillP]

Dear Bill,

A nice analysis. Thanks.

Cheers,

Roger

Example of passive:

Example of active:

The first was taken with a 90mm Elmarit-M wide open, the second with a VC75mm at about f3.5. In each case the use of differential focussing was deliberate, but in the second, there is an out of focus subject that completes the picture.

Regards,

Bill

 

[ZivcoPhoto]

Poor out of focus qualities would make me decide to buy/not to buy, or SELL a lens as I did my 40mm Nokton "Classic".

To me, severe out of focus renditions are as much a negative to a successful photo as lens flare...which is why I sold a Summicron ASPH 35mm.

My 35mm Summilux ASPH has neither issue in three years of use... with a big bonus...it is tack sharp at F1.4.

 

[tripod]

Hmmm small sensor digi P&S with unlimited DOF?

Close focus, wide aperture, long lens. If you want more pronounced limitied DOF, use a larger format.

 

[tripod]

Certainly not at newspaper photo resolutions.

 

[tripod]

No, I develop and wet print my own B+W.

 

[tripod]

Okay, please call me John so that things are a bit more human.

The average person does not have the vocabulary to describe photographic effects or the in-depth knowledge of the photographic process, that those of us who hold photography as our passion. The effect in an image of wide angle lenses compared to long lenses may be unexplainable to them. Shallow depth of focus is a mystery to them. They comment as their capabilities allow them to. Often it is simply "I like it." Anyone of us here would be better able to analyse the technical aspects of an image.

Anyone in a specialised field of interest, especially one involving technology, will have an understanding and awareness of the control factors of the process that the average person would not have.

So no, very few if any of my friends and family have commented on the bokeh of any of my shots. That's hardly an arguement against a photographer understanding and utilizing a variable that is under his or her control, is it? I'm sure painters know stuff about their craft that I do not, yet they use their knowlede to create paintings that I can enjoy, without that specialised knowledge. Do you see?

 

[tripod]

Oh, and of course in your PJ line of work, content is king. The finer points of photography like bokeh belong to more contemplative photographic genres, where content is still the most important aspect of an image, but the photographer has the possibility of using the finer controls that are available. Other examples of this are using film instead of digital, using real B+W film instead of C-41 B+W, using fiber base printing paper instead of RC.

 

[David Goldfarb]

I suspect that when David Burnett published his very successful Holga images from the Al Gore campaign, most people couldn't discuss the bokeh, field curvature, or falloff of illumination characteristic of those images, but they probably did see them as dramatic photographs with a unique look. Burnett knows about those things and could use them consciously, but the viewer doesn't need to know how it all works.

There has been a real surge of interest in historic processes and classic large format lenses in recent years, and people are noticing things like the way lenses render the out of focus image. Maybe that's a small subset of people who do photography, but they're out there, and they're active, and they are not only interested in lenses, but they are aware that you can make aesthetic choices by selecting one lens over another.

Again, it's not as if this is really a new issue. It was not an issue from about the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s, but the way that lenses rendered the out of focus portion of the image was quite important in the 19th century up through WWII, and began to wane in the 1950s, I'd say. Julia Margaret Cameron, for instance, had very strong views about where the ideal plane of focus was in an image, because she was criticized for her choice of focus. Focus was seen as an aesthetic choice, not an obvious fact. Soft focus lenses produced from around the 1890s through the 1940s were all about the way a particular lens rendered out of focus elements. There wasn't just "in focus" and "out of focus," but rather the particular out of focus quality of a Verito, Pinkham-Smith Visual Quality IV, Veritar, Beach Portrait, Kodak Portrait, Nicola Perscheid, Heliar, Imagon, etc., and with such lenses, the location of the plane of focus is an aesthetic choice, and the degree of diffusion of focus can usually be varied.

Those who say there was no interest in this issue before people started calling it "bokeh" just don't know the history.

 

[tripod]

Some guys I just don't get.

edit added: I'll agree to disagree wih you Fred. Peace.

 

[gavinlg]

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