Bokeh or manipulation?

Willi

Willi

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I'm not sure if this has been discussed before but what does everyone think of post production background blurring?

I know you can mess about with Photoshop etc. but my Pixel camera will blur the background with a click of a button and make me look like a much better photographer or that I have much better equipment.
 
Photography, since the earliest times, has always been about manipulation of light.

This is one another manipulation that’s available now so just use it unless it’s against the rules. That’s my view.
 
Lightroom has a new-ish feature to do this. which I have played around with a bit.

Vey clever, but not quite clever enough (it needs a fair bit of fine tuning) and it's not really applicable to most of the things I do. Perhaps if I did more portraiture it could be more useful...

Rather more fundamentally, I have lingering reservations about maintaining the integrity of the image. Faking bokeh just feels wrong. If I really wanted to shoot at f/1.2, I have a couple of lenses that will do that for me.
 
I find the fake phone bokeh to be absolutely atrocious in most implementations. In a lot of the images, there's no natural roll off. Just a point where your subject is and everything behind looks like it was shot with maximum bokeh and compression (with errors around fine detail like hair strands). Yet, in front of the subject you get an acceptably sharp image.

That's not how focal planes work.

That being said, the implementation gets better year after year. I'd like to think I could still sniff it out though.

The Lightroom implementation is better but it's still not there for me. I always get an uncanny valley feel.
 
Willi said:
I'm not sure if this has been discussed before but what does everyone think of post production background blurring?

I know you can mess about with Photoshop etc. but my Pixel camera will blur the background with a click of a button and make me look like a much better photographer or that I have much better equipment.
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It's definitely not Bokeh, and not something I would do but not because its terribly wrong just I don't like editing enough.

Shallow DOF doesn't make you a better photographer, unless it's being used creatively to emphasize your subject. Get your mask wrong in editing & it will ruin the shot completely :)
 
I think should you take hundreds of photographs in a session you'd simply have no time to go in and 'add' bokeh manually to them all and then select the best photo. If it is a purposeful 'art' photo then post processing might be considered part of the artistic indulgence. In all cases the viewer/customer should be told of any post processing enhancements or AI interventions.
 
What pixel model do you have? Sometimes with the telephoto lens you can get swallow depth of field (bokeh)
 
depends what you are trying to achieve - lots of stuff can now be done in PS (and LR) - I always think of a "load of balls" when bokeh is mentioned - plus it's a word invented by the Japanese in modern times, I believe in the 1990's.

but as long as you are honest there's no harm in trying anything in PP
 
I use it sometimes... along with removing distractions, etc. Generally, to do those kinds of things really well requires a fair bit of time/effort/skill; so it's certainly easier to avoid the need if possible.

I don't feel the need to inform anyone of the edits I have made... I am (hopefully) making pictures to be appreciated (art); not a documentary.
 
I think it looks pretty naff ....it's getting better but it doesn't have the natural bokeh fall off that the real thing has .....to joe public it probably isn't that noticeable but I think to photographers that know the characteristics of a fast lens would notice the difference . Artificial bokeh is just like a blurry filter that's applied everywhere but the subject whereas the lens produces bokeh that varies naturally over distance etc
 
Good view points from different levels of abilities and equipment here. For the amateur or less well healed of us I think it can, like cropping and adjusting levels etc. tidy up a "snap" into something quite acceptable. Especially for online or family photos.
 
I mostly do it in camera, but have used Alien skin bokeh a Photoshop plug-in a few times, it's the best I've found to mimic real bokeh.
 
See a lot of it on the BBC website. Or at least lots of unnatural looking photos. :mad:
 
Marino said:
What pixel model do you have? Sometimes with the telephoto lens you can get swallow depth of field (bokeh)
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Bokeh & shallow depth of field are different things. Shots with shallow depth of field often allow the bokeh to be judged, which is quite impossible if everything is in focus.
 
Petrochemist said:
Bokeh & shallow depth of field are different things. Shots with shallow depth of field often allow the bokeh to be judged, which is quite impossible if everything is in focus.
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I thought bokeh is the blurred background(and whatever comes with it)
So it’s not the blurry background rather the blurry patterns created by the Lens? God I’m confused now:eek:
 
Marino said:
I thought bokeh is the blurred background(and whatever comes with it)
So it’s not the blurry background rather the blurry patterns created by the Lens? God I’m confused now:eek:
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Bokeh is not a blurry background, it is a lens characteristic. And just like sharpness, it takes a point of contrast to be able to evaluate that lens characteristic. I.e. if there is nothing in focus you cannot evaluate a lens' sharpness capability; and if there is nothing to differentiate in the BG you cannot evaluate a lens' bokeh rendering. Any lens can create a completely blurred background in certain situations... there is nothing particularly unique about that.

The easiest way to think of it is as "bokeh balls"... how a lens renders out of focus points of light (contrast).
 
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Marino said:
I thought bokeh is the blurred background(and whatever comes with it)
So it’s not the blurry background rather the blurry patterns created by the Lens? God I’m confused now:eek:
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Yes it refers to the character of out-of-focus areas in the image. Your gut reaction may be to find some more attractive than others, and they certainly have an impact on the image and how we may feel about it. But it's an arch contributor to the picture space. There's good bokeh & bad bokeh. And for any given lens it'll vary according to aperture, distance, etc.
 
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Marino said:
I thought bokeh is the blurred background(and whatever comes with it)
So it’s not the blurry background rather the blurry patterns created by the Lens? God I’m confused now:eek:
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Loads of people miss use the term, but yes it's the nature of the out of focus highlights. Bokeh can be shaped, smooth, harsh...
If all was meant was a shallow DOF there would have been no need of a new term :)

Catadioptric lenses are quite well known for their doughnut shaped bokeh, which sometimes gives an interesting effect. Other times when there are no clear highlights in the background the bokeh combines to produce a distracting double image effect as can be seen here:

FS test - Reflex + focal reducer by Mike Kanssen, on Flickr

Like many things art related Bokeh can be highly personal, some will rave about the bokeh a lens produces while others find it awful :)
 
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Petrochemist said:
Like many things art related Bokeh can be highly personal, some will rave about the bokeh a lens produces while others find it awful :)
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Yes there's a subjective element - but I've noticed that the internet being the internet, many comments about bokeh are untutored and naive (I don't mean you there, Mike!) - . It's something that you have to educate your 'eye' & trust your gut about ... indeed I get the impression that many people haven't even recognised it as a 'thing', or like to deny its relevance. But everything within the picture space is a contributor to that picture space.
 
Yes it's manipulation, does it matter? no, unless you're presenting your photo as a version of the truth. e.g. I can't see how a manipulated photo could be used for photojournalism - especially now we have fake news.

In the examples I've seen it looks pretty naff, but it will get better and will become unnoticeable
 
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I think the software is best used to where there is already background blur and you want to increase it a bit sort of like using an f4 lens but making it look f2.
 
Petrochemist said:
Loads of people miss use the term,
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Yeah, looking up for pictures on the internet show pictures with just blurred backgrounds. I looked it up out of curiosity because I remember some old Russian made lens producing some sort of a circular pattern which is rather appealing to me.
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Thx for the info anyway, learned something new (useless info to me but still good to know how to communicate in terms of photography).
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So I suspect @Willi was referring to the background blur (shallow depth of field effect) instead of bokeh?
 
I've always thought there was a relationship between depth of field and bokeh, in that the former can influence the appearance of the latter (obviously as well as lens characteristics). The Lightroom implementation of the generated bokeh and depth of field attempts allows you to customise both aspects including the shape and appearance of the bokeh effects.

I think @Marino you're thinking of the Helios 44-2 for the swirling bokeh. I could be wrong though.
 
soupdragon said:
Bokeh, gimme a break.
Only "Leica types" and so called "lens experts" concern themselves with that sort of garbage.
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And the rest of us, yokels as we be, just bash on, clumping through the mud in our wellies ... ;-)
 
Minimum depth of field images are rarely anything like equalled by manipulation of an otherwise normal depth of field image. However already out of focus areas can often be enhanced in software to be less distracting. There are many tools in Photoshop to achieve this. It is better done in layers as it is more easily adjusted or reversed that way.

What I have seen in AI so far, has been far less than convincing. And perhaps better avoided for now. It will be all too apparent, when looking back in the future, how poor today's AI attempts really are.
 
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sk66 said:
Bokeh is not a blurry background, it is a lens characteristic. And just like sharpness, it takes a point of contrast to be able to evaluate that lens characteristic. I.e. if there is nothing in focus you cannot evaluate a lens' sharpness capability; and if there is nothing to differentiate in the BG you cannot evaluate a lens' bokeh rendering. Any lens can create a completely blurred background in certain situations... there is nothing particularly unique about that.

The easiest way to think of it is as "bokeh balls"... how a lens renders out of focus points of light (contrast).
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In my opinion, this whole "bokeh" thing has gotten out of hand. It started as how a given lens rendered out-of-focus specular highlights and evolved into any blur in the background. No one really understands what it is, but everyone tries to appear erudite about something that is really nothing to begin with.
 
The Online Photographer has talked about bokeh a lot. There's a piece here with links including one for a Harold Merklinger article.

theonlinephotographer.typepad.com

What Is Bokeh?

There's another lively long thread about "bokeh" at Photo.net that's garnering some attention over there. It's a bit disorienting for me now when I post at other sites; despite the fact that my name was referenced several times in the...
theonlinephotographer.typepad.com
 
soupdragon said:
Bokeh, gimme a break.
Only "Leica types" and so called "lens experts" concern themselves with that sort of garbage.
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I wouldn't quite say that... bokeh characteristics can seriously impact an image. Like how overcorrected aspherical errors can cause defocused backgrounds to become very busy/distracting, or how undercorrection can cause the same with defocused foregrounds... this particular characteristic "flips" between FG/BG.


Adam-G said:
I've always thought there was a relationship between depth of field and bokeh, in that the former can influence the appearance of the latter (obviously as well as lens characteristics).
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There is; more specifically the depth of focus (the sensor side aspect of DOField).
The defocused elements cannot be so far out of the DOFocus as to be nearly indistinguishable, because that negates how the lens focuses them (and thus the defocus bokeh characteristic).

This is an example of overcorrection ("soap bubble bokeh") causing doubling ("nisen bokeh") in out of focus linear BG elements. Note that it only causes the effect within a certain range of defocus.

Untitled-1.jpg
 
Willi said:
Good view points from different levels of abilities and equipment here. For the amateur or less well healed of us I think it can, like cropping and adjusting levels etc. tidy up a "snap" into something quite acceptable. Especially for online or family photos.
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Don't get mixed up between the 2 scenarios; no one is saying 'manipulation / fake bokeh is bad', what most of us are saying is 'badly implemented manipulation / fake bokeh is bad', and most phones, and the simplest of software make a really bad job of it.

It's not snobbery, or because some people have better kit - it's just objectively bad.

I won't repost here, but a year or so ago I posted a photo of my grandson in a photo share at work, and one of my colleagues responded with "135mm f2?", whish was absolutely correct. So the simple truth is that... if a photographer can spot the 'look' of a certain lens, they can also find it much easier to spot a 'click of a button' fake bokeh. Also, from a 'photography' viewpoint, I'd hope that what makes that image attractive is my choice of light, background and the decisive moment to create a mood which is also enhanced by the Bokeh.

In short, photography isn't about 'bokeh', shallow DoF, composition rules or 'gear', but about all of those things in the hands of a skilled photographer, and pretending none of that matters because 'I've got a button on my phone' isn't really valid.
 
See, that's why I don't consider myself a "photographer" just an old "snapper"!

Just a little fun with a phone snap of my granddaughter

IMG-20240618-WA0000.jpgIMG-20240618-WA0000~2.jpg
 
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She’s cute and if you’re happy with that snap that’s all that matters for the purpose it was taken for. Genuinely.

But this is a ‘photography’ forum, and when I look at that shot, my eyes are drawn to the ears, the hair and the shoulder frills and they’re clearly a mess where the software has tried to work out what’s ‘subject’ and what isn’t. And then everything in front of the subject also gets ignored, that’s not how DoF works.

You asked for opinions :)
 
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I fully appreciate your opinion. This is a snap put on WhatsApp then I played around quickly on my phone. This is not a full frame image manipulated in PS. I suppose the point I'm trying make is about the whole manipulation of images and soon if not now you'll tell your AI what you want and click it will be there!
 
Willi said:
. . . tell your AI what you want and click it will be there!
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I agree . . . I think there will be a time when you point your 'camera' such that a gps and topography sensor in the camera detects where you are and just sends an image to your memory card and then AI will superimpose a library image from your library of the person/thing you want to be in the photo !
 
Marino said:
I thought bokeh is the blurred background(and whatever comes with it)
So it’s not the blurry background rather the blurry patterns created by the Lens? God I’m confused now:eek:
Click to expand...
The bokeh is affected by variations in the lens, focal length, number of blades in the aperture, number of elements, all sorts of things, it's not just the out of focus, it's the way the OOF is affected, highlights tend to show it up more.
 
Willi said:
I fully appreciate your opinion. This is a snap put on WhatsApp then I played around quickly on my phone. This is not a full frame image manipulated in PS. I suppose the point I'm trying make is about the whole manipulation of images and soon if not now you'll tell your AI what you want and click it will be there!
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But look at what it’s doing badly, in order for it do do it better isn’t just about edge detection, it’s also the camera having to measure each plane in the image and pass that info to software for it to decide how much each plane is out of focus.

If you do that manually in software, you can generally get away with 4 or 5 planes of focus, it takes an age. And it looks fairly convincing when done.

But just like ‘fake lighting’ it’s so much easier and quicker to take the bloody photo right in the first place.

The promises of Artificial Intelligence are still a million miles away from anything Alan Turing would describe as ‘intelligent’. It might be capable of writing workable code, but it can’t write convincing English, or even create a convincing hand in a ‘photo’. Though there’s rumours it can create a convincing enough politician to get idiots to vote for it
 
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Willi said:
I fully appreciate your opinion. This is a snap put on WhatsApp then I played around quickly on my phone. This is not a full frame image manipulated in PS. I suppose the point I'm trying make is about the whole manipulation of images and soon if not now you'll tell your AI what you want and click it will be there!
Click to expand...

If people are happy to disengage from photography, then that's great for them but it won't ever be for me.

By its very nature, AI image generation is a photocopy of the passion, intent and skill of all the images the machine has mined to learn from. The AI in essence will develop its own "style" and present that to everyone.

With the prevelance of smartphone photography there's already a huge swathe of photos taken with the same devices using the same computational post processing, with the same colour science and using the same focal length that every other owner of that particular phone is using.

I think the homogenous compression of society has gone far enough. But that's just me. Millions will disagree and they're welcome to their one click solutions.
 
I suppose it's where you draw the line, you have the purists who will want the original image untouched, no crop or adjustments and then the artists who will paint the image with light. Then there's the rest who just like what they see.
 
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