Chasing bokeh: Fuji 50/2

deednets wrote:

Last night I read a blog/article about the rendering of a variety of lenses, comparing a few Zeiss, Voigtländer, Leica lenses. There was also an emphasis on bokeh rendering. Aperture blades were mentioned and how those were positioned and shaped e.g. rounded, but inward pointing, straight etc. Also the fact that sunstars work in a peculiar way, creating even numbers on lenses with an even count of aperture blades, but doubling the sunstars when an uneven number is picked.

The review(s) is/are of little importance to Fuji lens owners, but the blog made me re-visit some photos that I had taken lately with the 50/2. Hardly a contender for the royalties that were reviewed in that blog.

But then I thought: hang on, the 50/2 is a remarkable lens, incredible value with excellent bokeh even in scenarios where the background, straight lines etc can look a tad nervous on occasion, but the 50/2 I think gets away with a lot.

What's your take on this lens compared to the usual suspects?

Not a lot of distance between the bells and the wall

Again not a lot of space behind the Buddha

Not a flat surface behind the focal plane this time

Some transition and some flatness in the background

Another transition with more space between objects

Some straight lines typically hot contenders for a nervous bokeh

And the lot: foreground and background blur plus some straight lines

The last one is possibly the most challenging as it has strong foreground blur plus background blur and straight lines. But I think that the lens is doing remarkably well here.

And here is one as a little teaser, taken with the 75/1.8 Olympus. I found that I started looking at the nervous bokeh almost straight away, have plenty of examples but this one example will do. I found that when I had the 75/1.8 - a MUCH longer focal length compared with the 50/2 - I had to be far more careful when I chose the background.

The 50/2 is far more forgiving and possibly a true steal for the price!

Deed

In the one image where there is significant foreground, it's not doing well. But the background treatment seems natural and un-distracting in these photos. And I've seen other samples that don't fair as well and when the subject is closer and the background is thrown out of focus more extremely, it gets pretty nervous. So I think you've found it's sweet spot for background.