The ultimate Bokeh thread; pics please

I just went through this thread from top to bottom, all at once, and I've decided a few things:

Pentax 50/1.4's really are some of the greatest lenses ever made - in every way.

I wish I still had my Canon LTM 50/1.5 and my Pentacon 6 mount CZJ 180/2.8 Sonnar.

And though some lenses do have inherently better or worse bokeh, they're all capable of producing either great bokeh or terrible bokeh, given the right occasion.
 
This thread is so great, sorry I don't have any scans to contribute. I've got a wish llist though. I think we're missing representation from Rollei 40/2.8 HFT, anything Contax G, and how about an SMC 85/1.8 just for me!
 
Mamiya C/C2 hybrid and Mamiya Sekor 105/3.5. I believe it's the first of its kind in this thread

2189196963_664febc29d_o.jpg
 
What causes swirly bokeh? This was one of the questions I hoped this thread would address. So far I would have to say that it does not seem to be an intrinsic property of any one lens design. Maybe older lenses tend to show it more than current designs? But I have yet to see a swirly image made with a medium or large format lens and most of them are older, and older designs.

Speculating here but it seems that the image composition is the largest factor in showing the swirly effect. Compose a shot with a random distribution of closely spaced highlights in the OOF, and have that be the center of the image with the in-focus areas pushed to the corners, and presto - swirl. Other thoughts?
 
Swirly lenses seem to concentrate light in the OOF into the edge of the circles of confusion nearest the center of the image. They also seem to distort the circle a little, into more of a hyperbola shape.
Could this be astigmatism showing up OOF only? I guess you could test by taking a swirly lens and making a picture with point sources in the foreground OOF. They would form radial lines instead...
Just a guess.
 
When I Google "swirly bokeh," most of the examples are from large format lenses (supposedly the 3-element lenses are the most likely to get swirly) and the 50/1.0 Noctilux. Some more I just came across with swirly bokeh are the Classic Heliar 50/2, Helios 40-2 85/1.5, 50 Summitar, and the original Nokton.
 
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Thanks, Amin, for your kind comments regarding my pictures.

amin_sabet said:
When I Google "swirly bokeh," most of the examples are from large format lenses (supposedly the 3-element lenses are the most likely to get swirly) and the 50/1.0 Noctilux. Some more I just came across with swirly bokeh are the Classic Heliar 50/2, Helios 40-2 85/1.5, 50 Summitar, and the original Nokton.
Click to expand...

I agree with LF specialist Ole Tjugen in this post: swirly bokeh comes from astigmatism and vignetting. I would go a bit further in saying that it comes mainly from mechanical vignetting due to the rear part of the lens mount blocking some light rays around the edges of the frame, thus turning circles into "cat eyes" shapes. But, as you can see if you read the whole thread, this matter is subject to discussion.🙄

I have some pictures exhibiting this swirly bokeh. Most were taken with large format or medium format lenses, some with the Bessa R3M equipped with the Canon 50/0.95 or the Heliar 50/2. They were all taken with fast lenses used wide open and focused close.

If you want to duplicate the effect, put your subject in the center of the frame in front of a "busy" background located not too far away from the main subject (like some twigs with leaves on them and light filtering through), because the swirly bokeh will not show if the background is completely out of focus. The best lenses are usually those with large glass elements inserted in long tubes, because they will exhibit the greatest amount of mechanical vignetting. You can also adapt a black cardboard tube at the rear of your lens (like a narrow lens hood, but attached behind the lens) to enhance vignetting.

Cheers!

Abbazz
 
That's a great shot! Here are some shirly shots by others which I enjoyed finding while looking for examples:

3 swirly shots by Tommy Oshima:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommyoshima/281078121/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommyoshima/445174821/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommyoshima/246989204/

Gabriel M.A.:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gabrielma/1862504810/

Moaan:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/moaan/2039843441/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pm_photo/Nomad on the road films (Not as swirly, but I like it):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pm_photo/524838305/

Tetsuya Miyoshi with some of that sweet Summitar swirl:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/d-chimpanzee/463127282/

My Zuiko OM 50/1.2 has a pretty large rear element, but no tube around it. I'm afraid to put cardboard there since the pesky mirror might not clear it. Ah well, I'll pick up a swirly lens at some point. Thanks for the explanation and tips!
 
amin_sabet said:
Abbazz, I enjoyed your 50/0.95 images. Anyone know of any other lenses for 35mm photography, other than the Noctilux 50/1 and Canon 50/0.95 that produce the kind of "swirly bokeh" seen in the above image? I really like the effect.
Click to expand...

The swirl is caused by coma. The Noctilux, Summitar and Summarit (classic)
are very good at that.

Sunlit leaves in the background are always good to generate it.

Roland.
 
ferider said:
The swirl is caused by coma.
Click to expand...

Roland,

Let me quote Ole Tjugen (from the post precedently linked):
coma forms "light trails" away from the image center, not around it

When you take the image of a starry night sky with a lens suffering from a lot of coma, each off center star is transformed into a comet like shape (hence the name "coma"), with the tail of the comet radiating toward the edge of the frame (radial orientation). This is not what we see in "swirly bokeh," where the peripheral highlights are turned into cat eye shapes with a concentric orientation.

Another quote from Ole's post:
when you tilt a lens you will see that there is some point at which the aperture starts to look like a lozenge (or american football) and not an ellipse. Out-of-focus highlights will reflect this change in shape, becoming narrower with increasing distance from the center.
That's why it is possible to generate this swirly bokeh on large format by adding some vignetting by mechanical means (a black cardboard tube behind the lens).

Cheers!

Abbazz
 
Abbazz,

more often, coma is referred to as any aberration producing any kind of asymmetrical distortion of points in the image. Since lenses are round, typically these distortions appear in radial symmetry to the image center, which creates the impression of circles. Tails, comet stars and shapes that look like flying birds are only one variant. Elipses are another one.

Puts uses this definition, for instance (he provides a nice overview of the 7 Seidel aberrations). He also says:

spherical aberration and coma can only be combated by contrast reduction, evenness of definition over the image area, focus shift, vignetting and a host of other optical parameters.
Click to expand...

Which explains why you often see contrast/resolution reduction but less coma, for example in the corners of the typical Sonnar-taken picture.

Best,

Roland.
 
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