"Bokeh" explained

I am fairly new to the world on Leica and one of the first things

that I've noticed is this word "bokeh" being passed around. I

understand what it means but what I'm having trouble with is what

does it look like. Can some of you post photos that demonstrate an

example of good bokeh compared to bad bokeh? Many thanks in advance.

It's a financial condition, "Buying Leicas will make you Bokeh."

good - http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=good+bokeh

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bad - http://images.google.com/images?q=bad%20bokeh&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi

better than focusing on the word bokeh, you should merely keep in mind that different lens designs have many subjective qualities apart from mere resolving power (and even resolving power is better described as a subjective effect having more to do with microcontrast/edge acutance than rendition of fine structures). some lenses have a harsh look to the out of focus areas; some have nice 3d quality that gives images plasticity (especially lenses that have "poor" flat field performance); some produce creamy skin tones in b&w; some are very pleasingly soft. mtf charts are not the end of the story.

 

but to answer your question, bokeh relates to how a lens renders out of focus areas. these can be quite distracting if the OOF areas are high contrast or distinctively patterned.

Bokeh, as I have come to learn it, is the quality of the out of focus areas of a photo. Bokeh can be good, bad or neutral. Each of us may differ in what we think is good, bad or neutral bokeh, but many believe good bokeh is characterized by out of focus areas that are smooth, soft and with no hard lines...there is a nice smooth transition from sharp-in-focus areas, to outside the DOF area. Bad bokeh is the opposite - harsh, hard and showing bizarre shapes in the background. Neutral is somewhere in between. <p>

Some people, including Erwin Puts, attribute bokeh from how many residual abberations are left in a lens' design. The more abberations, the better the bokeh. Highly corrected lenses, like the Leica 35/s ASPH have neutral to harsh bokeh...the 4th version 35/2 non-asph lens had great bokeh ( and thus had lots of abbs...still in the deisgn )<p>Others insist that the shape of the aperture, number of aperture blades affect the bokeh...<p>

 

Hope this helps<p>

<a href="http://www.antiquecameras.net">www.antiquecameras.net</a>

Here it is, everything you ever wanted to know about bokeh and then some!

 

http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/bokeh.shtml

 

Have fun!

good bokeh..<div></div>

very smooth, very good bokeh

oops

trouble attaching<div></div>

bokeh, n., that unquantifiable subjective quality which can always be used by a lens owner to counter any factual data or evidence presented which challenges his assertion of the superiority of his lens.

and bad bokeh?<div></div>

would this be good or bad bokeh?<div></div>

Rusty:

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Some links that might help:

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http://www.bokeh.de/en/

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http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/bokeh.shtml

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http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bokeh.htm

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<img src="http://jimdoty.com/Nature/Michigan/Greenville_MI/03G22G01_wr3_MI_Lily_7470.jpg">

<br>Michigan Lily, Canon EF 100mm macro lens

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The the out-of-focus highlights in this images are ok to my eye (fairly good boke for my tastes). I have tossed out images where out of focus shapes seemed to "jump out" of the image at the viewer rather than recede softly into the background.

<p>

The background on this image is a little busier than I would prefer, but still somewhat soft due to the choice of aperture. I could have softened the background more with an even wider aperture but I wanted to maintain resonable detail in the lily. I don't like the dark twig to the right of the lily, but it was about the best angle to shoot from with the least busy background.

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Jim

Before Nisan-Bokeh we had Gaussian blur. Did the blurred background point highlights resolve as nice smooth fuzzy edged discs merging seamlessly into neighbouring smooth fuzzy edged discs (Gausssian) or nasty hard edged rings?

 

That is my utterly simplistic take on the whole issue.

However the industry became pre-dominantly Japanese so it makes sense that we now have a Japanese expression for pleasing blur rather than a German name for it.

More information and examples here:

 

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1030&message=6129997

Y'know, if this were a troll, it'd be a "hook, line, and sinker" troll...

Fran篩s Courtois - GOOD BOKEH in my eye !

Rusty, welcome to the totally insane world in which we live. On another level I posted a photo of Janis Joplin with a motion blurred left hand. Only women noticed and commented on it. No men at all! It generated several emails! Some said it looked claw like or grotesque. Others remarked at the raw power and emotion exemplified by the blurred hand. You can't make everybody happy! I'm not sure that you could get 10 people to agree on whether a particular photo had good or bad bokeh, unless it was an extreme example.

I enjoy your posts Jay, but this time your closed, dark and negative outlook on a topic you seem to understand little, disturbs...but what the hell to each his own

Rusty,

 

If you like it, it's good. If you don't like it, it's bad. If you don't care either way, it is

neutral.

 

jmp

"bokeh n. that unquantifiable subjective quality which can always

be used by a lens owner to counter any factual data or evidence

presented which challenges his assertion of the superiority of

his lens."

 

On the other hand, "Le couer a ses raisons que la raison ne

connait pas."

 

Party on, Jay! Lock your little M on a sandbagged tripod with its

Summicron parked at f8. Release its shutter with a cable. Take

your film to the lab where all the 'pros' you know go. Take your

results home and keep them in your den, secure in the

knowledge that no matter how boring, trite and stale they might

be to others, to you, they are technically flawless, and thus,

unassailable.

Go see Spiderman II; look at the movies; look at the focus pulls. The movie industry uses lenses with "good out of focus" qualities; so a focus pull from one character to another is good. <B>One "focuses" on the characters and plot of the film; instead of "out of focus artifacts".</b> What has been common knowledge in film making for almost a century has now been "discovered" by some still photographers. Eager with their discovery; they had to coin a new goofy term; Bokeh. In the 1940's 1950's and 1960's; some movie folks just called it "good out of focus imagery"; or others. <BR><BR>Bokeh is like a college graduate coining a new term for cow dung. They can march into an old farmers field in Iowa; and define new jazzy terms for ears of corn; cow dung; dirt; tractors; heck the sun. Since the old farmer never used the "new coined terms"; he must have never known what the heck he was doing. It is abit laughable that some folks act like this "bokeh thing" was just discovered.<BR><BR>Bokeh is just a new "trendy" term for a lens optical property that has existed for all lenses; for many centuries. Because there was no short cute term; doesnt mean that certain lenses were not coveted for good "out of focus properties". <BR><BR>

There is another aspect as well. An old term often applied to the quality of the image produiced by a lens "plasticity." As I understand it, plasticity refers to both what we know as bokeh (affecting out of focus areas) and also to a certain "roundness" or softness of an image which also affects the in focus areas. If you look at a photo having this quality (plasticity) you will see that it simultaneously looks both sharp AND slightly soft. This I think is also the effect of (spherical??) residual abberations as described by Putts. (It may also be helped by having uncoated lenses as they produce a slight flare which can soften an image.)

 

If you can access it, have a look through the excellent book by Ivor Matanle "Collecting and Using Classic Cameras." There are several excellent photos which display this quality including one of a small girl on a swing (you will know it immediately when you see it) The photo was, from memory taken by another classic camera -not a Leica, but for me says it all about the benefits of really good classic lenses and their ability to transcend the fact that in strict technical terms (as we now define it) they do not compare with modern lenses in terms of resolving power or contrast. ie They still take bloody good photos which in other respects are actually far nicer to view.