About that Bokeh (Another FF/m43 comparison)

BruceB609 wrote:

I understand the technical objective of the OP and looking at the light bulb comparison, the D810 does have more blur but that wouldn't be my choice anyway. Being very personal, choices can be manipulated enough to make this a very trivial issue. More megapixels, more blur… ... this is about DOF blur and I'd like to offer another consideration when choosing blur softness.

I prefer

I agree that the content of the following paragraph can often be a consideration. Whether it is to be preferred for any particular case must certainly depend in part on the content of the background. Preference of the type of approach in general, is, as you say, a personal preference. Neither is objectively superior in every case.

adding more information to the composition by relating background effects to the well pronounced subject, in order to build the story, having the background inject more information and elaborate on the subject. Again, it's a personal choice but I've seen a lot of nice detail shots weakened by too much background blur. I'd say the photo as an entirety matters more than anything, especially in the first few moments of seeing it on a wall, the initial impact or impression one may get before more detail evaluation. This is where 5 megapixels can outplay the advantages of 16 or more megapixels and I can be numb to numbers or formats.

However...

...

This shot, in NYC, has enough information in the background blur to indicate a city location, that she was probably sitting in relation to standing figures in the back.

Really?!? My first impression of the shot was of a (short) standing person at an outdoor suburban or rural social event.

The circles in the blur accentuate the same in her eyes or what she's wearing. If I'd taken this same shot with extensive blur I'd have marred this opportunity. I may as well have shown you something that was taken in front of a bright mottled canvas backdrop in the studio… or wherever.

My impression is that this shot has either too much or too little blur. If you are really trying to establish context, you failed to do so, at least for me. Hence, too much blur for your intended purpose. Aesthetically, in the absence of meaningful contextual information, I find the background too busy and distracting, nice circles in bokeh not withstanding. I'd have preferred this at about f/2.2-2.8 FF equivalent instead of f/3.6. For your purposes I would have chosen something around f/8 FF equivalent. That would still only give a DoF of about 18" (as taken, you have about 8"), but would provide a bit more definition to whatever is in frame left.

Impressions, like choices, are indeed personal.