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Bokeh


za33photo

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Some people have a genuine thing for shooting fast lenses wide-open. And they do it well. Leica just reissued their old f/1.2 50mm Noctilux from the mid 1960s, as you have probably read about. It's not for me, but I do appreciate it. Let's just remember that it wasn't designed for bokeh, it was designed to let more light in. Not that there's anything wrong with bokeh. I do like nice bokeh, and I appreciate how different lenses render.

 

But, a lot of other people merely imitate - they are what you'd call NPCs (non-playable characters, with no thoughts of their own). I loathe affectations in photography, such as colour torture, or "HDR", or shooting everything at f/1.2 because it's "cinematic" (even though DOF has nothing to do with the cinematic look whatsoever).

 

Then there are affectations in cinema such as the weird green tint you might see in some movies, the tendency to massively underexpose to give the image "richness", or the now unfashionable orange & teal. All of this junk ruins photography.

 

At the end of the day, there's junk everywhere. But, thankfully, we can always opt out and stay away from it altogether.

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Bokeh is not a fad, but a word used to talk about the subjective quality of the out of focus areas of a photograph.

In English it was coined by photo writer Mike Johnston (He proposed the spelling "Bokeh" to make it sound like the original word is pronounced in Japanese "Boke"). I think he coined it 20 years ago, but bokeh has always existed of course, even when the word wasn't used.

The word makes it easier to talk about this specific property of the photograph, but many think that; more out of focus = more Bokeh = better.

That is however a misunderstanding. Bokeh is not a matter of more or less, anything even the slightest out of focus can be discussed as bokeh.

 

I am guessing you mean that people are overdoing the "out of focus" thing, and I kind of agree with that.

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Niels
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Bokeh is not a fad, but a word used to talk about the subjective quality of the out of focus areas of a photograph.

In English it was coined by photo writer Mike Johnston (He proposed the spelling "Bokeh" to make it sound like the original word is pronounced in Japanese "Boke"). I think he coined it 20 years ago, but bokeh has always existed of course, even when the word wasn't used.

The word makes it easier to talk about this specific property of the photograph, but many think that; more out of focus = more Bokeh = better.

That is however a misunderstanding. Bokeh is not a matter of more or less, anything even the slightest out of focus can be discussed as bokeh.

 

I am guessing you mean that people are overdoing the "out of focus" thing, and I kind of agree with that.

Agree.

 

Though I do like to shoot my lenses at or near wide open, perhaps more often than is strictly necessary, but I choose my lenses based on their 'character' (aberrations) and that is typically most pronounced wide open.

 

Super fast shutter speeds on modern cameras have made shooting fast lenses wide open in daylight without ND filters possible, so that may be one reason we see more of it now.

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How recent is this fad.

 

The desire for creamy (or not) out-of-focus areas and highlights goes back to the early days of photography, and is not anything new, except for the name (see NHSN above).

 

here is a 1950 discussion

Selective-Focus-1950-04-PP-(pre-Bokeh).thumb.jpg.1ecdb259dbf666f76d164e5640127e77.jpg

Popular Photography 1950-April

 

My personal favorite name for the phenomenon was the term "brokeh", which, so far as I know, was coined by a naïf here on early P.net.

 

Here is an example of the beloved (by police?) doughnut 'brokeh' from a mirror lens:

 

Campus-Lake-Sigma-600_20101010_042.jpg.e4f9ceebc5530aa785f9427726e5a070.jpg

'love them donuts'

Sigma 600mm mirror lens

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How recent is this fad.

Personally I detest it , but I do understand that others seem to love it.

Is it merely a "fashionable" thing.

:D

Cheers.

As already mentioned, it is neither recent nor a fad. It is the way a lens renders, which was and is important from the moment lenses were used to capture their projected image.

If you really detest considerations concerning how your images look, you must also detest shutterspeeds, apertures, focus, motion, etc., and perhaps a visual medium is not the one for you? May i suggest, say, writing or music as an alternate hobby? Both very much worthwhile.

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Do lenses have character the same way wine (or beer/whiskey) glasses have character ?

It's more or less the same way lenses have character. Really, they do.

Most are not special. Some are. Some are even made so you, the user, can change its character at will, but within limits.

There are quite a lot of photographers who pick and use lenses for their character.

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Personally I detest it , but I do understand that others seem to love it.

 

By now I think the posts above have made it clear that what you detest might best be called "selective focus" i.e. shooting with a large aperture that blurs the foreground (if any) and background in order to draw the viewer's attention to the subject. To me, it's just a method/tool, and sometimes a good way to shoot individuals or small groups who might otherwise melt into a crowd at events, or birds that would otherwise be less distinct within some vegetation, etc. It's related to panning in order to capture a moving person or object while the background gets blurred by the camera motion. I wonder if you detest that too?

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Bokeh is a technical, very subjective term, which is often misapplied by folks new to photography. I wouldn't call it a fad, as others have pointed out, but rather a popular misconception confused with a subject in focus and background out of focus...a style many people seek to achieve.
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To me, it's just a method/tool

Indeed! It’s one of an unlimited number of attributes, tools, effects etc that we can use to help a picture tell its story more clearly, convincingly, warmly, starkly etc. Like the rest, it can be overused, misused, poorly simulated, or otherwise included to call attention to itself, distract the eye from noticing that the image is boring or otherwise unappealing, etc. As with everything else, it’s not what you use, it’s how you use it (and often whether to use it at all).

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I haven't done it in many years, but we used to wipe a light smear of petroleum jelly selectively on a UV filter to add pseudo-bokeh to shots for which lighting and/or the nature of the subject required stopping down and/or slowing the shutter. I even did that over an enlarger lens a few times.

 

I think it's also worth pointing out that we've all used other resources to the same end. It doesn't have to be focus that isolates, highlights, and/or draws the eye to a given area or content - it can also be physical objects, lighting, etc either alone or combined with selective focus and appropriate exposure settings. Sometimes it's even the choice of composition that makes the difference.

 

wineglass_bokeh.thumb.jpg.21572d50c0de2c2d4693d1bf77528061.jpg

 

chupah2.thumb.JPG.b47084896ed515d5c9db4f49e7697aed.JPG

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Only 1997?

 

It seems to have been around a lot longer. Like the use of horrible and lazy direct-flash papparazzo lighting by fashion and 'beauty' snappers.

 

The word 'bokeh' only irritates me when used incorrectly to describe any old out-of-focus effect. Such as: "this f/1.2 lens provides bags of awsome bokeh" - Uuuurgh!

 

The use of the word also coincided with the proliferation of pictures showing unnecessary and distracting OOF highlights behind the real subject. And that I do find slightly sad and annoying. More sad really; that people are so easily influenced by a few 'trend setters'.

 

Yes, we get it! Your lens has SA well under control. Now concentrate on the subject, and not the background. Please!

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In the end, isn't "bokeh" as much a matter of personal preference as anything? And yet any photographic background is as much a part of the photo as any other part of the shot? I've done a lot of what you might call "selective focus" on shots- as I've learned manual & analog photography. Sometimes with decent effect

 

p3205374521-5.jpg

and sometimes maybe not so much:

 

p3947736421-5.jpg

 

At some point does a discussion of how to use "bokeh" (in the background or foreground- per the linked article) also become about framing and subject placement in a photograph? About context of the focused subject within the bigger sense of the scene?

 

Beyond choosing a lens specifically for the way it renders OOF areas, are there any hard, fast rules on how/when/why to deploy bokeh- or is all this just a matter of personal preference (or a photographer's vision) of how to portray a given subject and/or a subject and its context within a certain space/setting etc?

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In the end, isn't "bokeh" as much a matter of personal preference as anything?

Not addressing your photo itself ...

 

Personal preference can be influenced by current tastes, prevailing trends, by Hollywood movies, by Madison Ave. ads, etc. I think what some here are conveying is that what might seem like personal preference may not be as personal as it sometimes appears.

 

And even if a preference is personal, many prefer gimmickry and easy outs to more challenging methods of expression or visualization. Many personal preferences in photography are shallow or less visually articulate than others.

 

Personal preference isn’t always a great reason for doing something.

 

Context, as you note, and many other factors are at play.

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"You talkin' to me?"

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I think most of us recognize when someone is just fixated on shooting wide open on a fast lens for the sake of shooting wide open. It seems to me that some things like very shallow DOF and long exposures of waterfalls or the ocean originated from a time when film was slow and more exposure was necessary, and that aesthetic is now a legacy.

 

As regards bokeh, it's definitely something I pay attention to. For example, I had a Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 85mm f/1.8G, a reasonably priced lens that was decently sharp with nice enough bokeh wide open, but when I stopped it down even a little the shape of the aperture started to show and its cat's-eye bokeh was pronounced even wide open. My Nikon AF-DC NIKKOR 105mm f/2D is a much nicer lens in this regard, its bokeh is smooth at all aperture settings and its cat's-eye bokeh less intrusive, so even though the 85mm lens was sharper wider than f/4 I sold it and kept the 105mm lens. OTOH, while the bokeh is nice on my Tamron 45mm f/1.8 VC, I will take the slightly more sketchy bokeh from my Nikon AF-S NIKKOR 24-70mm f/2.8G when I want fast auto-focus and the ability to zoom when shooting action. The are different tools for different goals (for me) and I feel comfortable with my priorities.

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All of it is important, because in the picture.

Yes! Additionally, not all photos are similarly subject oriented. Sometimes the subject either isn’t physically shown in the picture (the subject can be an emotion or quality), the light itself can be the subject, or the photo rather than an object in it, can be the subject.

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"You talkin' to me?"

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[...] Now concentrate on the subject, and not the background. Please!

None of us create images that contain/show just the subject. All of it is important, because in the picture. DoF and the way unsharp parts are rendered are important tools, determining the impression produced by the entire image. Just as light and dark and anything in between, or colour and monochromaticity, sharp and unsharp and how they contrast or blend is something worth concentrating on too. It determines how the subject is presented.

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In the end, isn't "bokeh" as much a matter of personal preference as anything? And yet any photographic background is as much a part of the photo as any other part of the shot? I've done a lot of what you might call "selective focus" on shots- as I've learned manual & analog photography. Sometimes with decent effect

 

p3205374521-5.jpg

and sometimes maybe not so much:

 

p3947736421-5.jpg

 

At some point does a discussion of how to use "bokeh" (in the background or foreground- per the linked article) also become about framing and subject placement in a photograph? About context of the focused subject within the bigger sense of the scene?

 

Beyond choosing a lens specifically for the way it renders OOF areas, are there any hard, fast rules on how/when/why to deploy bokeh- or is all this just a matter of personal preference (or a photographer's vision) of how to portray a given subject and/or a subject and its context within a certain space/setting etc?

 

In a word, yes, a personal choice. Rules? You don't need no stink'n rules or rationalizations for when and why to use it and it is a completely creative as any other photographic tool or technique. Its not as easy as one thinks to get a good creamy boke if that's what you want.

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