Vignetting Shminetting - What's The Big Deal?

dcsang

dcsang

Canadian & Not A Dentist
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Ya know.. I don't get it.

The Internet is a wild woolly playground that has so much information out there if you just go searching for it.

I decided to perform a search on "vignetting" via Google.
There were a bunch of links that came back from the search with all sorts of information but mostly, on an initial perusal, I found the information pertained to removing vignetting or avoiding vignetting or which lenses produced the most pronounced vignetting wide open and so on.

I don't know about the rest of you but I LIKE vignetting in images; specifically images with people in them. I find it draws my attention to the centre of the image. Now, I know, I know; sometimes you don't always want the primary subject at the centre of the image - so.. then stop down a notch or two - but really, I honestly like when an image has some vignetting in it.

I think there is an aesthetic quality to the image that seems to be added when vignetting is present versus not being present or removed. Perhaps I'm the only one on here that feels this way but I would think there must be others.

What say you??
Do you like vignetting?
Hate it?
Want to rid the world of it and its ilk?
:D

Cheers
Dave
 
Dave, for certain subjects I agree that vignetting can enhance the image. And remember how our darkroom instructors told us how to 'burn in the corners' to make the centre of the image stand out? I still do this with certain images in Photoshop CS3, using the vignetting tool not to take away vignetting but to add some.

Gene
 
half a stop or so is OK. But more - no, I hate it. Much easier to introduce
vignetting than to correct it in PS.
 
I always liked how my M-Rokkor 40 had vignetting with some of my b+w images. Is it light fall-off?
I thought it created a real emotional quality to some of the images, although it's hard to describe why.
 
The only lens I have that vignettes (noticeably, anyway) is my VC 15mm. I like it. Like Dave said, it helps draw the attention back into the photo. Very handy on a super-wide, almost too-wide sometimes. It does give a certain feel that is lacking in a print without it, not that either one is better than the other.

I knew a guy back in school that added very slight vignetting (less than 1/2 stop, I recall) to all of his prints in Photoshop. He was shooting and scanning color slides, and printing at Costco. The amazing thing was, it gave the image some "pop" it didn't have before. You could compare prints with and without, and it was very hard to see what made them different, unless you were looking. The ones with vignetting almost always looked better.
 
I agree... too many people i've seen get all huffed and puffed up over a little lens vignetting...

i mean seriously... almost all of the modern lenses and vignetting is nothing compared to some of the vignettings you would get in some of the oooollllddd crummy cheap lenses.

I dont think it hurts or detracts to be honest....

As others have mentioned I was taught just as most others have to burn in your corners to bring the eye inward a bit. I do this all the time. It is always a subtle effect that works wonders.

I think people get too caught up into things like this, when there is nothing wrong with vignetting at all.

I think the whole 'holga phenomenon' frightened a lot of people into thinking that "OMG. VIGNETTING.... what do i do? what do i do??? people are going to think i took it with a holga, and all of my friends who hate holgas will think that i haven o skill and im only using a gimmicky camera."

;)
 
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Vignetting, isn't that where the hood intrudes into the corners of the pictures? I really really hate that.. :D


Now, light fall off away from the center, that's an easthetic trait.. ;)
 
I like vignetting the majority of the time, although I can't quite put into words how I feel it relates to the philosophy of photographs. Considering it appears mostly in my indoor pictures, with subject matter generally being people, I quite like the effect, usually complimenting OOF effects to direct the eye.
However, (unrelated to rangefinder photography) I don't like the extreme vignetting that they put on some sections of the television program: Top Gear
- that just drives me mental.
 
I like it in small doses. I guess with a lens that doesn't exhibit much, you can always add it if you wish. But harder to correct it back out if you don't.

So if I had to choose between two otherwise identical lenses - one with a slight vignette, and one without. I'd choose the one without because it gives me more options and control.

That said. The amount of vignette a lens shows has never been a deciding factor.
 
I love vignetting! except that time I use the wrong rubber hood on my Zuiko 28/2.8. Man I was kicking myself because of the dark corners. Don't do this folks, it's not pretty :)
 
Dave, I see you on line. Are you stirring things up and now lurking around your post? C'mon out like a man.. and about those crummy vignetting lenses.. "pix or it didn't happen"

j/k/h
 
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