mike_johnston2

<p>P.S. I see I just barely missed posting that on the proper date. Ah well.</p>

<p>Wow, my old Bokemeter! I haven't seen that in some number of years (I'm a bit fuzzy on exactly how long it's been).</p>

<p>Harold Merklinger, Professor Screweyes, and Poindexter Neffe developed that one for me, and it was built by our good friends at Nikon through the kind offices of Uncle Arthur Kramer, who of course was Nikon's account executive with Ernst and Young way back before my time. Uncalibrated, it had too much tolerance for ni-sen--of the type sometimes created by the overcorrected spherical aberration of AIS manual-focus lenses.</p>

<p>I quietly let it go when I got my new Blair in 1984, and then de-accessioned that one when I got the Clarke in 2001. Now even the Clarke seems like old technology, compared to, say, a 2009 Cameron.</p>

<p>Nice to see that old thing again! It's still a nice machine.</p>

<p>Be careful of false readings with large-aperture long teles.</p>

<p>Best regards,<br>

Mike Johnston / TOP</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I noticed that years ago, early 1980s, while a journalism student and college newspaper editor. When selecting photos I could tell which photographer took which photos by the character of the out-of-focus areas. A couple of the students used Nikons; one used a Canon A1. The Nikkor shots always had distinctly harsher blur.</p>

 

</blockquote>

<p>Hi Lex,</p>

<p>Yeah, I used to be able to go through <em>Sports Illustrated</em> and pick out who was using Nikons and who was using Canons.</p>

<p>And people do respond to these things even when they don't know what they're responding to. It's like they sort of "sense" it, semi-consciously. Some people prefer certain kinds of "looks" in pictures even if they can't describe for you what the effects are that are making it look the way it does. It's very interesting. I keep threatening to do more research in this area, but it's a lot of work to make the prints, and nobody pays for that.</p>

<p>There's a lot of individual taste involved. Certain tonal properties drive me nuts, for instance, like HD curves that sag in the middle. I always strive to keep my preferences in check when looking at the work of others--it's very limiting to reject other peoples' work just because you don't like their technique. So I always try to be "open to convincing" when looking at other peoples' stuff.</p>

<p>I remember once showing some prints to Phil Davis, and he mentioned that I was getting a lot of edge effects and suggested a few steps I might take to reduce them. I was a bit hurt, because I had worked hard to figure out how to produce the effects he was talking about! I loved the look; to him it looked more like a problem. De gustibus....</p>

<p>Mike</p>

<p>P.S. The older I've gotten, the more important perpendicularity becomes. [g]</p>

 

<p>SG Adams,</p>

<p>That 135mm Xenar you have is a Tessar-type long noted for beautiful out-of-focus rendition. The Nikkor 45mm f/2.8P is a modern Tessar-type with beautiful blur. That Xenar of yours is gorgeous.</p>

<p>I know a portraitist who uses a Tessar-type large format lens, a Goertz. The out-of-d.o.f. effects she gets from it are lovely. Every now and then she makes noises about switching to a modern lens and I have to talk her out of it.</p>

<p>Nikon discovered in the 1960s that people think lenses are sharper when the background blur is harsher and the transitions not as smooth. It makes the in-focus objects stand out more. So they started overcorrecting for spherical aberration. Many lenses from the '70s on (to this day) are designed this way. It's no accident that many Nikkors are known for "bad" bokeh--it's in part the same thing that made them known for "good" sharpness! But there are some really good Nikkors too. The most recent example I've used is the new 24-70mm f/2.8. That's a great lens in a great many ways, one of which is that it has very nice blur, especially for a zoom.</p>

<p>Mike J.</p>

<p>Ron Tincher,</p>

<p>To answer your specific question, the only thing that governs bokeh is the specific lens you use on a specific film or sensor, and how you deploy (use) it. The appearance of the bokeh can change with the aperture used, the focus distance, the contrast of the subject matter, flare, how far the out-of-d.o.f. objects are from the plane of focus, and whether the out-of-d.o.f. objects are in front of or in back of the plane of focus. Nowadays it can also change with the post-processing (I almost always select the specific areas of a digital print that I want to sharpen, because sharpening the whole picture can have nasty effects on the bokeh). If your lens is a zoom, the character of the bokeh can change at different focal lengths. That's already enough variables to make the number of possible combinations of conditions effectively infinite; but fortunately, as you use a lens, you'll gradually get an idea of what its bokeh looks like, and how to avoid situations you personally feel are unattractive or how to elicit results that please you.</p>

<p>There's really no substitute for just learning your own lens and how it behaves. Allegedly (I've never been able to find the exact quote--I heard it from Arthur Kramer, former lens guru of the old "Modern Photography" magazine, and he doesn't remember where he heard it either), a Leica lens designer once said that the only real way to test a lens is "to use it for a year--everything else is a shortcut." Whether that's a real or an apocryphal quote I don't know, but it's true.</p>

<p>Mike</p>

<p>Bob, I'm just using a 28/2.8 AI.</p>

<p>Kevin, beautiful! They don't make 'em like they used to...literally.</p>

<p>Kelly, thanks. I actually knew that. What I was curious about is which diopters physically fit, i.e., screwed or slipped on with no problem. But I didn't realize that different parts of a viewfinder might be at different virtual distances--that's very interesting.</p>

<p>I owned a Nikkormat briefly many years ago. I can't remember now why I sold it, except that in those days I liked to buy new cameras and I frequently had to sell the old ones to raise money to play with. I seldom shoot film any more but every now and then I have to go through the shopping process for a new film camera. It amuses me, anyway.</p>

<p>Mike</p>

<p>Eric,</p>

<p>That's great. Those are the easiest to find. (Might even still be available new; I'll have to check.)</p>

<p>Do you happen to know if are any more modern, brighter, "snappier," i.e., easier-to-focus focusing screens are available for retrofitting in the Nikkormats?</p>

<p>Mike</p>

<p>...And if so, can you tell me what kind of correction eyepiece (often called a "diopter") the Nikkormat FT3 takes?</p>

<p>I need a -2 diopter but I don't even know what kind the Nikkormats take. Is it the same kind as the F and F2 take? Does the FM/FE/FA style eyepiece fit? Do the Nikkormats have their own specific eyepieces?</p>

<p>Thanks for any help--</p>

<p>Mike</p>

<p>"Bokeh" simply means blur, specifically out-of-focus blur (as opposed to the kinds caused by subject or camera movement). It includes, but is not limited to, out-of-focus highlights. Out-of-focus specular highlights are simply where aperture shape will show up most easily in pictures (i.e., spots of bright sky in out-of-focus foliage, for example).</p>

<p>The word or spelling have nothing to do with "bouquet."</p>

<p>The original articles were published in the March/April 1997 issue of "Photo Techniques" magazine, which I edited at the time. (Long out of print, unfortunately.) Carl Weese introduced me to the term. The articles were written by John Kennerdell, Oren Grad, and Harold Merklinger. Harold's article is online; I think you can find it at The Luminous Landscape. Oren and John still write for me on occasion at The Online Photographer. The only reason we added the "h" to the end of the Japanese word was that English speakers persistently mispronounce "boke." It's properly pronounced in two syllables, "bo" as in "bone" and "ke" as in "Kenneth" with equal stress on each syllable. "Bokeh" simply renders that a little more accurately. At least adding the "h" stopped all the "toke" jokes.</p>

<p>The other nice unintended consequence of the spelling was that it made the term easily searchable on the internet. In the weeks following the publication of the issue, I was able to watch as the number of search engine hits for "bokeh" went from 15, to 90, to 450, to 8,000 and so on. (A Google search just now yielded 2,790,000 hits.)</p>

<p>I fail to see how the term "bokeh" can be "pretentious," any more than the terms "sharpness" or "saturated" are pretentious. It's simply a descriptive word for a quality some photographs show (and some do not).</p>

<p>There's also no "good" or "bad" bokeh. As my father used to say, "if it works you're right, if it doesn't work you're wrong." Same for bokeh: if you like it, then it's good. If you don't like it, then it's bad.That goes for blur itself, as well as for its specific properties. Some people just don't like blur in pictures.</p>

<p>There's some agreement, but it's very rough. For instance, more people than not seem to dislike "ni-sen" (Japanese for "double-line," or near enough) bokeh, but the late Phil Davis (author of "Beyond the Zone System") showed me a picture he liked taken with a very odd, <em>very</em> old camera that featured a church steeple way in the distance. The lens had rendered it as TWO very blurry church steeples, quite widely separated. I've still never seen more egregious ni-sen. Phil liked the effect enough that he had framed the picture. See above, under "if you like it...."</p>

<p>"Selective focus" just means that part of a picture is in focus and part isn't--and, hopefully, the photographer knows enough to control which is which. (Many photographers don't, sadly.) The opposite of selective focus is sometimes called "pan-focus," which just means that everything is sharp from front to back. The term pan-focus has nothing to do with panning, which is a different technique altogether. I know, photographic terminology is a mess, and getting worse all the time. Don't blame me.</p>

<p>The Japanese term for the connoisseurship of lens bokeh--its aesthetic effect--would probably be "boke-aji," which translates roughly to "taste of blur."</p>

<p>There's no perfect lens for bokeh. Please don't ask me how I know, as it's very painful to suffer from such a blatant mental infirmity.</p>

<p>Learning how your lens renders blur, however, is no different from learning its other characteristics, such as whether it's unsharp at certain apertures or whether it smears the corners, or whatever. Some people like that kind of thing, some people don't. It's all good. If you want to learn it so you can attempt to apply it or control it, fine; if you don't, and prefer just to take pictures and let the chips (both the sharp and the blurry chips!) fall where they may, that's fine too.</p>

<p>Most often, these days, I just say "blur" rather than "bokeh."</p>

<p>There are some great examples in this thread.</p>

<p>Mike</p>

Mr. Wilkins,

You're quite the gentleman. On the one hand you say you're apologizing, but on the other, you turn right around

and assure me that all your belittling and insulting comments made previously were sincere. You even throw in a

few more for good measure.

 

I guess you win, then.

 

I have to say, you have vividly reminded me--and it's true that I had forgotten--why I stopped writing about

lenses years ago. In any event, I have decided to change my plans with regard to my new column here on Photo.net.

I had originally intended to make it a series of lens reviews, spiced with more general articles about lenses and

optics. The next column was going to be about the Zeiss 28mm f/2 ZF/ZK, and the one after that about the new

Nikkor 24-70mm; I had planned an article about purple fringing and another about the history of coatings. But for

reasons that I just cannot fathom, lenses are as difficult to discuss without exciting fanaticism as politics and

religion are. Some vicious, nattering little dispute that resists reasonableness is inevitably a

consequence--there is always someone lying in wait who insists on turning a molehill into a mountain or

vice-versa. Acknowledging that such people might have a different perspective, or cautiously qualifying every

other statement, or modifying what was originally said by stating plain facts more carefully, seems never to have

any dampening effect on the ardor of their disapprobation. Even humor seldom disarms.

 

I'm quite sure you, and those like you (you are certainly not unique), enjoy arguing. I simply don't. So, no more

lens articles from me on Photo.net. I'll find other things to write about, and if they excite the kind of

absolutism and recalcitrance that articles about lenses do, then at least the column following can be about a

different topic altogether and I can leave the previous one behind.

 

Mike Johnston

Michael,

Right, I had to barter a non-corporeal aspect of my being to a fellow in red tights with weensy little red horns on. You wouldn't want to know.

 

Seriously, you're talking about the JPEG on TOP? I had a hard time getting the color close in the little JPEG. You should see the pigment print on Photo Rag. Gorgeous. But it's just lighting, I'm afraid. No tricks, thus no tips.

 

Mike J.

Paul,

On further reflection, I've decided that you're absolutely right. With considerable urgency, therefore, I advise you to sell your 35mm DA Macro immediately. It is an inferior lens with insurmountable flaws, and it is painfully obvious to me and everyone else that you will never be able to take a good picture with it. I suggest you de-accession it while all the false, perfidious, lying, error-ridden positive reviews of it are still swirling around the internet, because if you act quickly some deluded fool will probably pay you good money for it, and you'll emerge from your harrowing experience relatively unscathed financially. Then, you can put the money toward the purchase of a lens that actually works. At which point you will be able to take pictures of your fridge magnets again at any aperture, as God intended, and all will once more be right with your world.

 

Sincerely,

 

Mike J.

Paul,

So your theory is what, that because you can detect it, it's a problem? The falloff with this lens is about half a stop in the extreme corners wide open. That's well controlled for a lens with this angle of view, easy to correct in processing, not objectionable (do I need to think of more ways to say this?)--and won't be noticeable to most viewers with pictorial subjects. That's my opinion. If you need less falloff for some reason, I would suggest a longer lens, or stopping down.

 

Mike

"Unlike Carl Weese ("no noticeable vignetting even wide-open") I can see it quite easily in some shots, including

MJ's wide-open sunset shot in his own review... :)"

 

Paul,

As many photo writers point out till they're blue in the face, it's necessary to read reviews with a "believe

what I say not what the illustrations might show" mentality. In this case you're making a very common error. When

you point the camera at a sunset, the sunset is the brightest place in the sky and the sky really does get darker

the farther away from the light source (sunset) it is. If you disbelieve this, simply look at the whole sky in

such a situation, from directly toward the sun to the opposite direction. Contrary to what some "experts" will

tell you, skies are almost never good subjects for vignetting trials, and my sunset shot not only isn't decent

proof for any claim about physical falloff in the lens, it isn't even evidence.

 

I like vignetting. I used to introduce it in darkroom prints by edge-burning, and I often add it to digital

pictures on purpose in post-processing. In the picture below, for instance, the falloff on the right is natural,

and I added some on the left for balance. (Others might not like it, but it's not their picture.) So I can

certainly see how different people might have different standards for falloff. All lenses have some falloff,

however slight. Given the controls we have for ameliorating it in digital, the falloff of the 35 DA Macro wide

open is minimal for its angle of view and trivial from a practical standpoint.

 

But whether you're fond of it or allergic to it, don't judge it from sunset shots.

 

All best,

 

Mike<div></div>

Robin,

I truly am grateful I didn't have a mouthful of coffee when I read your line "I am still unsure as to this lenses

suitability for anything except close-ups"--my keyboard might never have been clean again. If you own this lens

and can't get good infinity performance out of it, something's very, very wrong. As I read your comment, which

literally made me laugh out loud in astonishment, I had at my elbow a 13x19-inch print of a lake scene I made

last night. I still have pretty good near-field vision, but I need a magnifying glass to see the fine detail in

this print, which is very crisp and clear. I assure you the 35mm DA Macro is perfectly adequate for things other

than closeups.

 

But to get past that statement and address your concern, I do use the K20D exclusively with the "Pentax

Magnifying Eyepiece" (Pentax part # O-ME53). Carl uses one as well (in fact, the one I'm using is his backup,

which he sent me when Pentax sent me the K20D). Such devices don't always work as

advertised, but in this case it's a good accessory that does work very well and might help you with your focusing

issues. I haven't had mine off the camera since I got it, and I no longer even notice it's there.

 

All best,

 

Mike<div></div>

I don't actually own a Pentax at this juncture, although Pentax has been very generous with letting me keep a loaner K20D for considerably longer than the usual 30 days. It is the camera I've been using lately. Meanwhile, over at TOP, we seem to cover a lot of Pentax-related stuff, because Carl Weese, a regular contributor, switched to Pentax from his Olympus E-1 when the E-1 just got too old. (He doesn't care for the E-3, either.) He's written far more about the K20D on TOP than I have, including a recent review of the new 200mm lens.

 

I will have to sum up my thoughts about the K20D soon, but I'm reluctant to do it, because then I'll no longer have any real excuse to keep their camera any longer.... :-)

 

Mike

Well jeez, Miserere Mei, you're making me blush.

 

But don't stop there. Tell 'em the second column is a MAJOR article about Pentax. It really will be, I think. It's jointly authored by Carl Weese and myself, and we've been working on it for some time now.

 

Thanks for the kind words. I am not worthy.

 

Mike J.

 

P.S. It's going to be monthly, not weekly, so you might have to wait a little longer than next Sunday! Sorry!

It's a Wista and not a Wista. In the early days, before Wista designed and built its own wooden field view cameras, it relabeled Tachiharas. Your camera is a relabeled Tachihara. It is indeed labeled Wista, and was sold as such, but it wasn't built by Wista.