Canon 85mm 1.8 bokeh example

After days of messing trying to sort out the focus issues with my Canon 85mm 1.8 i came to a halt yesterday with pretty much -10 dialled in as a perfect solution.

Took it out into the woods today to see what sort of bokeh it can produce before blowing my budget on a 135mm F2L, surprised me by coming out quite well actually as you can see here shot at F2 with off camera flash.

Also surprisingly at this distance it was better at 0 than -10 so it seems the adjustment is only needed for shorter distances as it gets further back its almost spot on.

I think the 135mm F2L would still have given me better bokeh and less busy trees though ? Your thoughts ?




Canon 5Dmk2 85mm 1.8 @ f2 Off camera flash

wedding photographer newcastle durham darlington york and teesside

You are correct IMHO about the trees for certain, they are busy, and detract from the subject for certain.

Phillip Tornero said:

You are correct IMHO about the trees for certain, they are busy, and detract from the subject for certain.

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The question i am asking myself is if i had shot that with the 135 how much better bokeh would have been OR is it more a case of making sure there is less to be busy in the background, however choosing backgrounds to be perfect could be a futile pastime ! When i look closely most of the bokeh although good is not what i would consider to be great, as maybe it would be with the 85 1.5 or 135 ?

andrewdaviesphotography said:

After days of messing trying to sort out the focus issues with my Canon 85mm 1.8 i came to a halt yesterday with pretty much -10 dialled in as a perfect solution.

Took it out into the woods today to see what sort of bokeh it can produce before blowing my budget on a 135mm F2L, surprised me by coming out quite well actually as you can see here shot at F2 with off camera flash.

Also surprisingly at this distance it was better at 0 than -10 so it seems the adjustment is only needed for shorter distances as it gets further back its almost spot on.

I think the 135mm F2L would still have given me better bokeh and less busy trees though ? Your thoughts ?


Canon 5Dmk2 85mm 1.8 @ f2 Off camera flash

wedding photographer newcastle durham darlington york and teesside

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Technically, the maximum diameter of bokeh is equal to the diameter of the absolute aperture of a lens.

in case someone doesn't know, f-stop, which is mostly referred to when we talk about lenses, is the ratio between focal length and actual aperture diameter (fstop=Focal length/Aperture).The reason is fstop is more commonly used instead of aperture is because it's more practical.

As you increase the focal length, the angle of view, hence the cone of incoming light decreases, and a wider aperture is needed to capture the same amount of light. For instance, If you double the focal length, you'll need twice as wide aperture. However, f stop doesn't change. A 100mm at f/2.8 capture the same amount of light as a 50mm at f/2.8 even though the aperture of 100mm is twice as big as the 50mm. Thats why exposure depends on f-stop and not aperture.

anyways,

max Bokeh = absolute aperture=Focal length/f-number

85/1.8=47.2 vs 135/2=67.5 vs 85/1.2=70.8

So, you're right my friend. 135 f/2 is significantly more bokehlicious than 85 f/1.8. in fact, the bokeh from 135 f/2 is in par with 85 f/1.2.

Having said that, keep in my mind that you can get closer to your subject with a 85mm, which narrows the DOF.

andrewdaviesphotography said:

After days of messing trying to sort out the focus issues with my Canon 85mm 1.8 i came to a halt yesterday with pretty much -10 dialled in as a perfect solution.

Took it out into the woods today to see what sort of bokeh it can produce before blowing my budget on a 135mm F2L, surprised me by coming out quite well actually as you can see here shot at F2 with off camera flash.

Also surprisingly at this distance it was better at 0 than -10 so it seems the adjustment is only needed for shorter distances as it gets further back its almost spot on.

I think the 135mm F2L would still have given me better bokeh and less busy trees though ? Your thoughts ?


Canon 5Dmk2 85mm 1.8 @ f2 Off camera flash

wedding photographer newcastle durham darlington york and teesside

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you have to remember that when you have crazy background such as foliage and lots of tree branches, the bokeh doesn't turn out good, regardless of what kind of lens you have. i have the canon 85mm f1.8 and it gives me a nice bokeh when the setting is right ;-)

cheerz.

andrewdaviesphotography said:

After days of messing trying to sort out the focus issues with my Canon 85mm 1.8 i came to a halt yesterday with pretty much -10 dialled in as a perfect solution.

Also surprisingly at this distance it was better at 0 than -10 so it seems the adjustment is only needed for shorter distances as it gets further back its almost spot on.

Click to expand...

Well, as you get further from your subject, the DOF increases and you won't really be able to tell if the focus is "spot on" or not!

By the way, I've also been messing around with my Tamron 24-70 f/2.8 lately. I read it somewhere that for micro-AF adjustment its better to set the focus at infinity before each reading, and make sure you're focusing in ample light.
I'm still getting inconsistent results though, not sure what I'm doing wrong. I'd love to know how you adjusted your lens.

Kasra A said:

andrewdaviesphotography said:

After days of messing trying to sort out the focus issues with my Canon 85mm 1.8 i came to a halt yesterday with pretty much -10 dialled in as a perfect solution.

Also surprisingly at this distance it was better at 0 than -10 so it seems the adjustment is only needed for shorter distances as it gets further back its almost spot on.

Click to expand...

Well, as you get further from your subject, the DOF increases and you won't really be able to tell if the focus is "spot on" or not!

By the way, I've also been messing around with my Tamron 24-70 f/2.8 lately. I read it somewhere that for micro-AF adjustment its better to set the focus at infinity before each reading, and make sure you're focusing in ample light.
I'm still getting inconsistent results though, not sure what I'm doing wrong. I'd love to know how you adjusted your lens.

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Well i tried various techniques, the one in the end that gave the most consistent result was the simple AA Battery technique, simply stand a row of AAs at 45 degree angle to the camera at roughly 50xfocal length at the same height and shoot at the middle one !

However although this worked well at shorted distance indoors once taken outdoors i had to rack back to 0 for the best results. So take whatever you want from that !

135L will give much better bokeh than 85f1.8... but don't get too carried away because really the subject should steal the show.... nice bokeh is fine but imho improves the photo but does not make the photo. Also because with portraits the f stop is pretty much determined for you by the dof you want, it means you may not always obtain the best bokeh the lens can offer anyway...

I have owned for many years all the L primes 85Lii, 100is, 135L, 200L, 300Lis and 85L is most specialist and best bokeh (as reputation will also confirm). 100is is worst. 300L is sharpest.

However, I now use 72isii at 2.8-4 for portraits as I found my bokeh desires waned as my ability to shoot better compositions/portraits improved!

72isii and 16-35ii are now my walk around lenses.

expro said:

135L will give much better bokeh than 85f1.8... but don't get too carried away because really the subject should steal the show.... nice bokeh is fine but imho improves the photo but does not make the photo. Also because with portraits the f stop is pretty much determined for you by the dof you want, it means you may not always obtain the best bokeh the lens can offer anyway...

I have owned for many years all the L primes 85Lii, 100is, 135L, 200L, 300Lis and 85L is most specialist and best bokeh (as reputation will also confirm). 100is is worst. 300L is sharpest.

However, I now use 72isii at 2.8-4 for portraits as I found my bokeh desires waned as my ability to shoot better compositions/portraits improved!

72isii and 16-35ii are now my walk around lenses.

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Thank you, that is a useful answer. I understand the need for better backgrounds too but as mainly a wedding photographer i am sometimes limited to what i can use depending on the type of venue shooting in and sometimes the ability to completely blur the background is a godsend !

As i venture more down the portrait path too and hopefully combine the two worlds I will be in better positions to choose locations and hence not so much dependent upon bokeh.

I much prefer to shoot light and unobtrusive so the 70-200 2.8II is too heavy and not really my cup of tea i have the 70-200 F4 and it does not get much use by me. Hence looking for a lighter more specialized prime.

That is a nice list of primes you have there, would you say then that the 135L is the best addition to my current list 24,35,85 ?

wedding and landscape photography by Andrew Davies

Kasra A said:

Kasra A wrote: "max Bokeh = absolute aperture=Focal length/f-number"

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LOL. You can't calculate 'bokeh' with a formula!! It's a noun used to describe the aesthetic appearance of OOF areas in an image, and its value is entirely subjective - you either like it or you don't. It's not *only* about maximum aperture, number of aperture blades, or the size or circularity of OOF highlights, or the shallowness of depth of field. It cannot be measured!

I frequently hear people say that, since they'll never shot at f1.2, there's no point in buying a 50L. I think they're under the impression that, from f1.4 onwards, the bokeh from all lenses is identical, but that's just not true. If you line up the 50/1.8, 50/1.4 and 50/1.2 and shoot the same picture at f2.8, or f4, the quality of the bokeh will be different in all three and, in my opinion, the 50L produces by far the best image, with the greatest '3D pop'. It's affected by contrast, colour saturation and other factors in addition to bokeh of course, but the bokeh is still subtly and importantly different.

There are other fast lenses however which produce bokeh with completely different characteristics. Some people like 'em, some people don't.

Andrew - you chose a very challenging image to assess the 85's bokeh! Apart from the noisy background, it's difficult to see past the screaming green colour! It's surprising how different the image looks (including the bokeh) when you drop the saturation in the green channel, or convert to b&w...

Leaving aside the wisdom of an obsession with fuzzyness...

If you used a 135mm lens instead of your 85mm lens, and you wanted the same amount of woman filling the frame the same way in the foreground, you would need to back up quite a bit.

The longer 135mm focal length lens gets less in the background than the shorter 85mm focal length lens, When the subject in the foreground is the same size.

So your fuzzy subject background would be smaller with the longer lens. The "nature" of the fuzziness would be hard to compare because there would be fewer fuzzy things to look at in the 135mm shot.

And if you moved the woman one foot to her right, the background would be all green instead of having the path in the shot. That would improve the shot a lot more than spending another $1000 on a new lens would.

The best way of understanding the perspective is to go shoot some experimental pictures with a zoom lens at different focal lengths.

It's harder to experiment with apertures unless you get you hands on a 135 f2.

BAK

Does that lens really have such bad vignetting? I have the f/2 and it does not have vignetting.

RedFox88 said:

Does that lens really have such bad vignetting? I have the f/2 and it does not have vignetting.

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Lol no thats added, simply because i like vignetting

BAK said:

Leaving aside the wisdom of an obsession with fuzzyness...

If you used a 135mm lens instead of your 85mm lens, and you wanted the same amount of woman filling the frame the same way in the foreground, you would need to back up quite a bit.

The longer 135mm focal length lens gets less in the background than the shorter 85mm focal length lens, When the subject in the foreground is the same size.

So your fuzzy subject background would be smaller with the longer lens. The "nature" of the fuzziness would be hard to compare because there would be fewer fuzzy things to look at in the 135mm shot.

And if you moved the woman one foot to her right, the background would be all green instead of having the path in the shot. That would improve the shot a lot more than spending another $1000 on a new lens would.

The best way of understanding the perspective is to go shoot some experimental pictures with a zoom lens at different focal lengths.

It's harder to experiment with apertures unless you get you hands on a 135 f2.

BAK

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Ok , the need to back up is fairly obvious but i would not be buying a 135 with a view to using it in confined spaces it would be primarily for open space portraits and candids.

The path is subjective, i placed here there because i prefer and wanted the path in the shot rather than just a mass of green, it was a test shot whilst out doggie walking so nothing over technical just wanted to see what the 1.8 could do.

On your last point you are spot on , I was just thinking taking my 70-200 back to the same spot and varying the lengths would be ideal however it is only F4 so not a true comparison still it will be nice to see what 200mm at 44 compares like with 85 at F2.

Getting my hands on the 135 is pretty much buying it for me hence trying to get as much help as possible before diving in.

Thank you for the advice.

Al Downie said:

Al Downie said:

Kasra A wrote: "max Bokeh = absolute aperture=Focal length/f-number"

Click to expand...

LOL. You can't calculate 'bokeh' with a formula!! It's a noun used to describe the aesthetic appearance of OOF areas in an image, and its value is entirely subjective - you either like it or you don't. It's not *only* about maximum aperture, number of aperture blades, or the size or circularity of OOF highlights, or the shallowness of depth of field. It cannot be measured!

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Good points.
I was trying to simplify the matter and merely comparing the (theoretical) sizes of bokeh using crude physics.
The quality of bokeh isn't just about its diameter.

Yes on FF I have always found the usual 50% rule works well when building a full range of zooms, so I used to have

24,35,50, 85,135,200 and 300 and on multiple bodies this covers everything....

Meant to say full range of primes of course!! As opposed to using zooms....

expro said:

Yes on FF I have always found the usual 50% rule works well when building a full range of zooms, so I used to have

24,35,50, 85,135,200 and 300 and on multiple bodies this covers everything....

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I have to say personally i find the 50mm redundant now in my set up and it just does not get a look in much prefer either 35 for full portraits or candids and 85 for head and shoulders.

I think i may be missing the longer end when getting the 135 but my second tog will still have the 70-200 , down the line i may consider another 200 L , had one before many years ago but sold it , god knows why as it was a wonderful lens - think it was just too much for my skills at the time !

cheers

Andrew

wedding and landscape photography north yorkshire

andrewdaviesphotography said:

andrewdaviesphotography wrote: "I think i may be missing the longer end when getting the 135 but my second tog will still have the 70-200 , down the line i may consider another 200 L , had one before many years ago but sold it , god knows why as it was a wonderful lens - think it was just too much for my skills at the time !

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I bought the 135L and the 200L (2.8!) together, but after much agonising I returned the 200. It's a fantastic lens - as sharp as the 135 for sure; maybe only lacking a tiny bit of the DOF control that the 135 provides, but in use I thought the focal length just wasn't different enough to warrant keeping/carrying both lenses. I toyed with the idea of returning the 135 and getting a 100L instead, but in the end I couldn't let go of the 135. That 135L is the reason I chose to sell all my other kit and buy FF Canon. It's an almost perfect lens. I do find the gap between the 50mm and the 135mm a bit awkward sometimes, but I don't want to lose the 50L either! I could plug the gap with one of the cheap 85/100 lenses, but they just don't float my boat the way the 50 and 135 do...

I agree 50 can end up in no mans land.... like you I go wider even to 16-24 or 70 and up now