Bokeh is not a 'thing'.

droj

droj

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Some are aware of the phenomenon called bokeh, whilst others aren't, and some remain vague about it. I'd say that it's a vital quality of a lens.

You want bokeh - easy enough - but is it good bokeh?

It's not like a simple 'thing' that you can switch on or off. It's quality may vary according to the nature of the photograph (light, distance, f-stop ...). For a given lens, you may like its bokeh in certain circumstances and not in others. The bokeh of certain lenses can be downright ugly.

Do you distinguish this? Is it something you pay attention to? Does it affect how you rate a lens? Do you have favourite lenses in this regard?
 
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I do think it is a personal preference, though there are certain ones I have found different reviewers and bloggers to hate
 
I've got a nifty fifty which has allegedly ugly bokeh, but I can't say it ever spoiled an image for me.

I also have the 135 f2L which has reputedly gorgeous bokeh, and I can say I really love the look of it.
 
Phil V said:
I've got a nifty fifty which has allegedly ugly bokeh, but I can't say it ever spoiled an image for me.

I also have the 135 f2L which has reputedly gorgeous bokeh, and I can say I really love the look of it.
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I do LOVE the bokeh from a 135mm quality lens, awesomeness. Can't beat it.
 
droj said:
Do you distinguish this?
Is it something you pay attention to?
Does it affect how you rate a lens?
Do you have favourite lenses in this regard?
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Yes, but it may not be the deciding factor.
Yes, ditto...
Yes, ditto...

Favourite lens for bokeh is a difficult one. I liked the Sigma 50 and 85mm f1.4's but I've come to appreciate the charms of older lenses with their imperfections and even faults. Of the older lenses I have I like the Minolta Rokkor 50mm f1.4 and f1.2, 85mm f2 and 135mm f2.8. Maybe not wide open as faults may be more apparent and maybe a bit too much but even then the look may suit the subject and make the shot. I have some shots taken with these lenses that just wouldn't look the same if taken with a technically much superior modern lens. The Minolta 50mm f1.2 in particular is IMO probably quite poor when compared to a really good modern lens like the Zeiss 55mm f1.8 but the way the sharpness falls off towards the edges can look beautiful to me when stopped down just a bit.

I think it's very much dependent on personal taste, obviously, but also on all of the things (technical settings and distance to subject / background and the nature of both etc...) that affect the final image.

As I mentioned the Zeiss 55mm... Sony have announced three GM lenses and one of their priorities is beautiful bokeh so it'll be interesting to see pictures taken with these lenses and any future ones.
 
frod said:
Just pre-empting the inevitable.
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I really don't understand.

The amount of things 'in focus' has no relationship to the 'quality' of what's out of focus.
 
macvisual said:
I do LOVE the bokeh from a 135mm quality lens, awesomeness. Can't beat it.
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It sounds like you're missing the point Peter. What 135mm lens? Or are you classing all 135mm lenses together? Or are you being facetious?
 
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Although I can distinguish 'bad' bokeh, for me, there are more important aspects to pictures than the quality of their bokeh.
 
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plamen_gb said:
I do think it is a personal preference ...
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Yes, that's what I'm on about. But to have a meaningful preference you have to have examined the results from a given lens in different conditions. How many people pay detailed attention to this aspect of lenses? To me it's a crucial quality.
 
macvisual said:
All 135mm lens length, they generally produce (for me) beautiful out of focus areas.
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No, sorry, you have missed the point - you're generalising.
Ed Sutton said:
Although I can distinguish 'bad' bokeh, for me, there are more important aspects to pictures than the quality of their bokeh.
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Go on, then ....
 
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For me whether it is a vital quality of a lens depends on what I am using the lens for.

I don't expect great bokeh out of a wide angle for example (which is probably more down to my lack of creativity than anything else) , but would expect decent bokeh it out of a lens I was using for portrait type photographs. Having said that, at the moment I am predominantly using an old 85mm af-d 1.8 lens which is not supposed to have good bokeh but I am very satisfied with it even though I also have the newer af-s. Bokeh is a relevant factor but sometimes other characteristics such as coatings or the lack of can contribute equally to how I rate a lens.
 
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droj said:
Yes, that's what I'm on about. But to have a meaningful preference you have to have examined the results from a given lens in different conditions. How many people pay detailed attention to this aspect of lenses? To me it's a crucial quality.
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Yes, it's important to me but there are other factors such as AF or not, size and weight, adapter needed or not and cost too and intended use... for example depending on what I intend to use the lens (mostly) for I may prioritise sharpness over bokeh or boken over sharpness or size and weight over everything. Everything "depends" but I'd give more weight to bokeh at 50, 85 and 135 lengths than others for example I can't say that I really care all that much about the bokeh my 24 or 28mm lenses give as I normally use then at apertures which will probably render thoughts of bokeh pretty much an irrelevance.
 
Ed Sutton said:
What about? I'm not interested in the quality of a picture's bokeh, I'm interested in what it depicts. And don't get me started on this modern craze for always shooting at the widest aperture possible..... :mad:
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I suppose caring about bokeh is an arty thing and if the subject is everything then maybe it doesn't matter. Note though that you can can get lovely bokeh at f8. It doesn't have to be something you only see at f1.x
 
woof woof said:
Yes, it's important to me but there are other factors such as AF or not, size and weight, adapter needed or not and cost too and intended use... for example depending on what I intend to use the lens (mostly) for I may prioritise sharpness over bokeh or boken over sharpness or size and weight over everything. Everything "depends" but I'd give more weight to bokeh at 50, 85 and 135 lengths than others for example I can't say that I really care all that much about the bokeh my 24 or 28mm lenses give as I normally use then at apertures which will probably render thoughts of bokeh pretty much an irrelevance.
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Yes, those considerations are valid generally, but I was hoping the discussion might stick to visual qualties ...
Ed Sutton said:
What about? I'm not interested in the quality of a picture's bokeh, I'm interested in what it depicts. And don't get me started on this modern craze for always shooting at the widest aperture possible..... :mad:
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I can't believe this, Dave - you only value a picture for what it depicts, and not its visual quality?
woof woof said:
I suppose caring about bokeh is an arty thing and if the subject is everything then maybe it doesn't matter. Note though that you can can get lovely bokeh at f8. It doesn't have to be something you only see at f1.x
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Well yes - I wasn't suggesting the over-simplified idea of having a certain aperture. How a lens renders isn't arty to me, though, it's across the board, for any purpose.
 
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Ed Sutton said:
Although I can distinguish 'bad' bokeh, for me, there are more important aspects to pictures than the quality of their bokeh.
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VEry much depends on the picture though doesn't it, if 90% of the picture is bokeh, then it stands to reason that it should be an important aspect and be crafted with just as much care as the in focus 10%
 
Yes it's important to me and certainly something I consider when buying a lens. It seems test scores are only concerned with sharpness these days but for me the way a lens renders is more important. Most modern lenses are plenty sharp enough IMO. Also, us togs have more of an influence on sharpness than one lens scoring one mark higher than another, yet there's nothing we can do about how a lens actually renders (outside of aperture, subject/background distance etc).

But the characteristics of a lens comes down to personal preference. I love the look from the Nikon 58mm f1.4 yet many 'complain' how soft it is. I also like my Tamron 150-600mm but have received comments about its "ugly onion ring bokeh".

As to my favourite lens I own? The 70-200mm f2.8 VRII (I only have one prime, the 50mm f1.8)
 
Alan Clogwyn said:
VEry much depends on the picture though doesn't it, if 90% of the picture is bokeh, then it stands to reason that it should be an important aspect and be crafted with just as much care as the in focus 10%
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Yes I grant you that too, Alan, but I was thinking less about 'crafting' in general than the inherent qualities of any given lens ...
snerkler said:
It seems test scores are only concerned with sharpness these days ...
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They have been for countless years! This could be another topic!
snerkler said:
... yet there's nothing we can do about how a lens actually renders (outside of aperture, subject/background distance etc).
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Exactly!
snerkler said:
But the characteristics of a lens comes down to personal preference.
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Again, yes. But that doesn't conflict with being open to the exact qualities of a particular lens's bokeh.
 
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droj said:
I can't believe this, Dave - you only value a picture for what it depicts, and not its visual quality?.
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Pretty much. When I look at a photograph I look at the subject, how it's organised in the frame, not how creamy the bokeh is or how the lens 'draws' the image. Those qualities are seductive, but superficial and for people who are fixated on gear and technique to fawn over.

I can't honestly think of a picture that has ever impressed me because of its bokeh. Can you?
 
Ed Sutton said:
... When I look at a photograph I look at the subject, how it's organised in the frame, not how creamy the bokeh is or how the lens 'draws' the image. Those qualities are seductive, but superficial and for people who are fixated on gear and technique to fawn over.
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Gawd, you're a tough nut to crack! I don't think that I'm on about seduction or superficiality. The overall quality of a photograph is a seamless compound of all its qualities, surely?[/QUOTE]
Ed Sutton said:
I can't honestly think of a picture that has ever impressed me because of its bokeh. Can you?
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If you meant SOLELY because of its bokeh, Dave, then that's another matter .... but even then, I wouldn't rule it out ...
 
Ed Sutton said:
Pretty much. When I look at a photograph I look at the subject, how it's organised in the frame, not how creamy the bokeh is or how the lens 'draws' the image. Those qualities are seductive, but superficial and for people who are fixated on gear and technique to fawn over.

I can't honestly think of a picture that has ever impressed me because of its bokeh. Can you?
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The subject makes the pic, but bokeh can put the icing on the cake ;) :p
 
droj said:
The overall quality of a photograph is a seamless compound of all its qualities, surely?
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The sum of its parts? Up to a point, Lord Copper. Just that some of the parts are more important than others, and for me bokeh is low down the list.

I knew I shouldn't have got involved in this thread. I must have been bored when I read it! :D
 
macvisual said:
All 135mm lens length, they generally produce (for me) beautiful out of focus areas.
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There is one 135mm lens which stands above the others for bokeh. Sony/Minolta's 135mm STF (Smooth Transition of Focus) which was specifically designed for best bokeh. As the name suggests, bokeh is not just the quality of the out of focus areas, but about how the lens renders the transition between sharp focus and unsharp.
 
droj said:
Yes, those considerations are valid generally, but I was hoping the discussion might stick to visual qualties ...
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Well, good luck with that and welcome to the internet :D

Bokeh could be crucial but I bet even you assess other things and assign weight to the various aspects and qualities as you see fit.

droj said:
Well yes - I wasn't suggesting the over-simplified idea of having a certain aperture. How a lens renders isn't arty to me, though, it's across the board, for any purpose.
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I'm not sure what you mean here about specific apertures. You do realise I was replying to someone else and also that bokeh will look different at different apertures?

On the arty thing, surely when assessing bokeh you're looking for a look you like and if so isn't this in part art? Or are you taking a purely physical viewpoint and looking for engineering decisions and mould marks? Even though I was an engineer I find it very difficult to view a picture, because that's what we're talking about here, simply in physical engineering terms... not unless it's taken for professional reasons as some sort of evidence or recording medium and assuming that it isn't then a part of it is surely art and assessing it's properties including its bokeh are artistic assessments.

Not sure that I agree with "across the board, for any purpose." Not that I want to expend too much brain power on that question but I'm sort of sure that some subjects and situations and some purposes will be best suited to less bokeh and some to more.

Anyway, enough banter.

Yes bokeh is important to me but it's just one factor I consider and when I consider it I consider it at different apertures and with different subjects. Further, I don't just look at the technical goodness and / or faults, I also consider what I think looks nice :D
 
droj said:
Some are aware of the phenomenon called bokeh, whilst others aren't, and some remain vague about it. I'd say that it's a vital quality of a lens.

You want bokeh - easy enough - but is it good bokeh?

It's not like a simple 'thing' that you can switch on or off. It's quality may vary according to the nature of the photograph (light, distance, f-stop ...). For a given lens, you may like its bokeh in certain circumstances and not in others. The bokeh of certain lenses can be downright ugly.
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The bokeh of reflex lenses, the notorious "doughnut bokeh", is among the worst and ugliest of all, very busy and harsh. Yet I have a photograph of a fierce sprinkler head with a 500mm reflex where that is good because it emphasises the pressured ferocity of the water spray.

Do you distinguish this? Is it something you pay attention to? Does it affect how you rate a lens?
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Definitely. I think lens sharpness is a much misuderstood quality. It's multidimensional, more than just detail resolution, such as line pairs per mm. Contrast and local microcontrast play a part. Local microcontrast can be emphasised by certain kinds of fierce bokeh, and by the spurious resonances of aliasing. In a sense bokeh is partly the underside of sharpness.
Do you have favourite lenses in this regard?
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My favourite is the 135mm Sony/Minolta 135mm STF. The lens is optically designed for good bokeh in two ways. Firstly by having smoothly featureless bokeh circles of out of focus light points, and secondly by having an apodization filter, in effect replacing the sharp edge of the iris with a graduated filter. It seems to be generally regarded as having the best bokeh so far achieved.

What I find interesting is that this kind of bokeh is neither a natural quality of a geometrically simple lens, or an optically perfect lens, or the human eye, considered as an optical instrument (which may be a misleading oversimplification).
 
droj said:
Some are aware of the phenomenon called bokeh, whilst others aren't, and some remain vague about it. I'd say that it's a vital quality of a lens.

You want bokeh - easy enough - but is it good bokeh?

It's not like a simple 'thing' that you can switch on or off. It's quality may vary according to the nature of the photograph (light, distance, f-stop ...). For a given lens, you may like its bokeh in certain circumstances and not in others. The bokeh of certain lenses can be downright ugly.

Do you distinguish this? Is it something you pay attention to? Does it affect how you rate a lens? Do you have favourite lenses in this regard?
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Some lenses do have "good" bokeh, however the lighting and background can make a big differece, as you say.
I do not rate lenes - if I have a poor perfoming lens (for what ever reason) I try to get a "better" one.

Here are some examples from the lenses which I think are ok,.

#1 Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM Lens @ f5.6 and at 310mm
The piper. by Richard Taylor, on Flickr

#2 Same lens a #1 @ f8 and at 400mm
Brown by Richard Taylor, on Flickr

#3 And the Olympus 40-150 f2.8 Pro + a 1.4 TC @ f5.6 and at 175mm
Yellow by Richard Taylor, on Flickr

#4 and I also have the Canon 135mm F2 L lens. Here @ f2.
The MC by Richard Taylor, on Flickr
 
I personally love the look of many photos from the Sigma 35mm 1.4 ART wide open and could even pick them out of a crowd of photos. The background just melts away and the oof areas are rarely distracting. There is a 3D quality that's hard to put a finger on.

Other than that, the Sony Zeiss 135mm 1.8 is my favourite lens of all time, it just obliterates backgrounds and even usually deals with awkward things like branches really nicely.
 
One of the things that turned me back to Nikon from Fuji was the way the bokeh rendered with the longer lenses. I don't know exactly how it works, but for greens in particular the oval bokeh balls were pretty distracting on the Fujis.
 
Phil V said:
I really don't understand.

The amount of things 'in focus' has no relationship to the 'quality' of what's out of focus.
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The point is, bokeh quality is sadly becoming a higher priority than the subject itself for some people.
 
No, "bokeh" rendering is not something I consider when choosing a lens. Heck, it didn't even "exist" (as a concept/factor) until the 90's.

The fact is, for bokeh rendering to be a factor you have to have a "distracting/busy" BG/FG to start with and that's something I try to avoid. And you can't generally fix "busy/distracting" with blurring.
 
DemiLion said:
Very nice, except there's virtually no bokeh in that photograph at all. Aptly demonstrating that most people (wrongly) just think it's an (extremely) out of focus area.
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And what there is, isn't that great.... plus, the BG remains pretty busy/distracting. If it wasn't for the color difference, I think it would be somewhat problematic.

Well, since "bokeh" refers to the quality/characteristics of OOF rendering... I guess, technically, almost all images have it.
 
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