Some of you may have recently seen this Kickstarter:
A quick-glance shows this project is going over like crazy. $500 gets you a relatively unremarkable anastigmat
triplet lens?? Crap - on eBay one can land A TRUE legend the Zeiss Planar, Sonnar or Voigtländer Heliar for much
less.
So what is this 'Wonder' lens's claim to fame? Bokeh-Fringing on highlights! Something that you can get from
any Tessar lens, and generally considered to be a defect. This is the selling point?? Apparently, the Trioplan
does it so much, and in such intensity that a deficit suddenly becomes a benefit - crap, these guys should work
on Wallstreet!
To be fair, some people do like this effect - especially, if the iris has enough blades to make the highlights
truly-round, but this lens should cost about $75. This is not a great lens, or a great concept, and countless
other vintage lenses do it exactly the same - due to limited correction.
So how do phenomenon like this happen? Photography is about extent and magnitude. There is little if any better
or worse (or more precisely accounting for taste). Noise and grain, suddenly become cool, when there is enough
of it, as does softness, over-blown contrast, poor white-balance or even outright blur. Much as 'getting high'
is valued for its interference of proper perceptual patterns, photography is valued more for breaking the
rules, than for following them - hence Terry Richardson's entire career.
The upshot, of this is that any concept or idea can be valid in photography, if executed enough. The downside is
by the time something is cool again, its already started to be uncool.
