Vignetting: Is it a dirty word?

[lynnb]

"it depends" - sometimes I like it, sometimes I want to get rid of it (not always easy). I quite often add subtle vignetting to portraits for reasons already mentioned by others, if the lens doesn't vignette as much as I'd like it to at the selected aperture.

I usually don't appreciate it in landscapes, but stopping down is not such a problem with them.

 

[Chris101]

Curses. I hate it when I pick my vote and it turns out to be the majority opinion. I used to shoot a 75mm Superangulon on a 5x7 - lots of vignetting. I learned to live with it.

 

[bjornkeizers]

Here's another pro-vignetting vote. I like that it for a framing tool, to 'draw you in' almost as if you're peeking through a telescope at a scene. Also allows you to hide the otherwise boring four corners.

And yes, I've even been known to add it in post just… because I liked the effect.

 

[Keith]

I like it but in moderation ... it can draw the eye to the centre of an image very effectively.

I don't have many lenses that do it so I tend to add it in post where appropriate.

 

[Sparrow]

Curses. I hate it when I pick my vote and it turns out to be the majority opinion. I used to shoot a 75mm Superangulon on a 5x7 - lots of vignetting. I learned to live with it.

... this is why I seldom vote

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

Hang on! My 14mm Samyang doesn't seem to vignette. Do you think I could get my money back????? 😀

 

[film nut]

Back in the 70's I was using pieces of stiff paper of different shapes mounted in front of my lense for vignetting. It was very nice for close-ups of people, plants and other still -life objects.

Mike

 

[ferider]

For us on Earth, would it be possible to elaborate on this subject. Or maybe clue us to a work that simply explains FS and Vignettings relationship. Thanks for the post.

There is no correlation other than the typical relationship between optical aperture and aberrations, cjc.

Regarding the original question: I hate very much dislike vignetting when it's introduced outside the lens, like via filters or hoods. When it's part of the lens behavior it's mostly nice, if you don't need it, just close down the aperture a bit. Just another tool in the kit.

What's causing vignetting here, lens, fog or sun ? 🙂

Roland.

 

[Roger Hicks]

No more than "35mm" or "large format" or "colour film" are dirty words. As Roland said, another tool in the kit.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Ko.Fe.]

Any other thoughts about vignetting?

I'm not so anal.


Hugs&Kisses. by Ko.Fe., on Flickr

 

[film nut]

Check out the Lomography web site for the new Petzval art lens. Artistic vignetting at it's best.

MIke

 

[lawrence]

Check out the Lomography web site for the new Petzval art lens. Artistic vignetting at it's best.

MIke

Thanks for the tip although I have to say that's truly the most distracting bokeh I have ever seen. I would put this in same drawer as those ghastly mulit-prism things that were popular in the 1970s (at least those are now on eBay at a more realistic price: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hasselblad-multi-prism-6-63-50695-63mm-new-in-box-case-/261401063557)

 

[kuzano]

Contains the eye to the image....

Contains the eye to the image....

That's what I was once told by an acquaintance who professionally judges photo competitions...... Certain things count plus....

White mats only, if submissions are matted

Mat a bit longer on the bottom to weight the image toward teh bottom

Vignette helps to prevent the eye bleeding off the corners out of the image. Contains viewing into the image. Slight, of course.

He did critiques at our camera club, and pi__ed a lot of people off. However, I know he did do a lot of individual and panel judging on photo competitions and was called on frequently to do so.

One of the reasons I burn out on camera clubs so easily..... It's not about photography in most camera clubs. They tend to be overly social and more often about the politics and control. I walk......

 

[Monochrom]

For us on Earth, would it be possible to elaborate on this subject. Or maybe clue us to a work that simply explains FS and Vignettings relationship. Thanks for the post.

hello, of course i´ll try to explain it simple.

I´ll talk about fast lenses but not aspherical fast lenses.

In order for a lens to be fast it must have a larger glass that can gather more light.
In order to do so the diameter of the glass must be increased.
and thus the aperture will achieve 1.4, 1.2, 0.95 etc which is a relation based on focal length, thats why the diam pupil of a 50mm lens at 1.4 is different than a 1.4 aperture of a 35mm focal length lens, bla, bla , bla...

With this clear we can talk about wether we want focus shift or vignette for supper...

the best example i can find about is the comparison tween v3 and v4 of the leica summicron 35mm.

The v3 vignettes but it´s focus shift is negligible, on the contrary the v4 which is famous and to my taste the most beautiful leica lens, has no vignette but tons of focus shift...i tested two copies and each one had the same FS, one different focus point for each aperture tested on my m9. I sold it immediatelly once noticed this....Also i´ve made tests in various other lenses observing exactly the same behavior.

When you have already an f2 capability doesn´t mean you also have delt with vignette, for avoiding this thing you must increase further the front element in order to illuminate the corners...and doing this, means you are entering focus shift territory...

FS is produced when you set your rangefinder at a given distance with a large aperture then extreme peripheral light beams (of this increased aperture) enter the lens and hit the focal plane but don´t match it, the effect is rangefinder at 1mtr resulting focus at 95 cm! ...for shooting hydrants or dark park benches it doesn´t matter! but for making portraits it´s a miserale fail!

Then FS is the incapacity of the lens to direct these peripheral beams into the same point as the center part beams.
On the contray the beams of the center part of the lens don´t show this behavior since diffraction won´t casue them the same misseffect, check a slow perfect lens as the best lens ever the elmar 5cm 3.5...

Vignetting is produced when larger apertures can´t illuminate frame edges.

And so i can´t stand missfocus, but i can live with vignette!

Bye!

 

[charjohncarter]

Monochrom, Thank you for that explanation. I thought it would be too difficult for me to understand but I do understand. I did a little pre-study on FS so I was able to not have to check that part out while reading. Again, thanks for the nice explanation. I have notice FS but didn't really know the cause. I wonder if SLR lenses are more or less prone to FS?

Anyway, I hope others will find this as enlightening as I did.

 

[Sejanus.Aelianus]

I wonder if SLR lenses are more or less prone to FS?

All lens design is a matter of balancing departures from perfection. This is because all the lenses we use are based on refraction through several interfaces. Typically, each interface is glass to air or glass to glass. Focus shift occurs in SLR lenses, but we tend to automatically correct for it, with manual focussing or rather clever programming of the firmware, in AF cameras.

The simile we used at school, to understand ray tracing, was of a column of soldiers marching several men abreast. While the men march along a straight road, they all march in step, so the lines of men and the rows are equidistant at all times. When the men follow a right hand curve in the road, the men in the column can do one of two things. Either the men on the outside have to move faster to keep their row straight or they can move at the same pace and the outside lines now trail back, distorting the symetry of the column.

Suppose that the soldiers followed the second option. If the column now negotiates a left hand bend of exactly the same diameter as the previous one, and follow exactly the same strategy as before, then they should leave the second bend with the original symetry restored. As the column negotiates more and more bends, there is more and more opportunity for distortion to occur in the column.

Of course, being well trained soldiers, they adopt a mixture of the two possible strategies and keep the column looking symetrical. Unfortunately, photons don't work quite like that and so each interface distorts or restores the "column" of photons with varying degrees of accuracy and thus we get the various optical distortions we all know and love 🙂

 

[lawrence]

I wonder if SLR lenses are more or less prone to FS?

I can't see why it would matter, since with an SLR you are focussing through the lens you automatically take any focus shift into account. With a rangefinder you're relying on the RF to focus so any focus shift is a bad thing.

 

[kennylovrin]

I can't see why it would matter, since with an SLR you are focussing through the lens you automatically take any focus shift into account. With a rangefinder you're relying on the RF to focus so any focus shift is a bad thing.

It also depends on the camera. If you shoot manual focus but with a camera that stops down the lens while shooting then you have exactly the same problem - what you see isn't always what you get as in this case you are focusing wide open but might shoot at a different aperture.

 

[ferider]

The v3 vignettes but it´s focus shift is negligible, on the contrary the v4 which is famous and to my taste the most beautiful leica lens, has no vignette but tons of focus shift...i tested two copies and each one had the same FS, one different focus point for each aperture tested on my m9. I sold it immediatelly once noticed this....Also i´ve made tests in various other lenses observing exactly the same behavior.

The 35/4 Summicron v4 does vignette significantly wide open, not much less than the v3, and so do her design cousings 40/1.4 Nokton and 40/2 Summicron, for instance. The Summicron v2 has a smaller rear element and vignettes more. Focus shift is closely related to the Seidel Aberrations (for example field curvature). Vignetting is not, at least not in general. You can build two lenses with the same Seidel Aberrations and identical focus shift but with different vignetting. Just put the wrong hood on your favorite lens and you will see.

Roland.

 

[redisburning]

I like vignetting.

Im not a big fan of distortion or resolution fall off, but I LIKE vignetting. never had a picture ruined by it, had a few made better by adding some.