32mm @ f/1.4 + CPL - Birds & Bees (PICS)

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f/1.4 STM + Hoya FUSION CPL filter.

.
A series of shots taken at f/1.4 (with a Circular Polarizer) on the EF-M 32mm f/1.4 STM lens today. I took a walk around the neighborhood since it's springtime right now. There were a few early insects, birds, bees and flowers that caught my eye.  I figured they'd help members to determine if this is a lens they'd like to use or not for whatever they like to shoot.  I just shot the Milky Way with it tonight and will put those images (just a few) in a separate thread.
.
Those of you familiar with faster lenses (from f/1.2 to f/2) will know how essential a circular polarizer can be (in lieu of a Neutral Density Filter) when shooting in bright sunlight. Especially if your camera doesn't have a high (1/8000) shutter speed or if you prefer a slower speed shutter. It's somewhat essential with an f/1.4 lens... but not indoors or in overcast weather. A CPL will further enhance the colors in photographs, creating richer hues with more saturation and often warmer colors. I've used a new FUSION Circular Polarizer here from Hoya - which I thought was going to be more sensible on this lens than the cheap $10 ones I've been using on the 22mm and 28mm lenses (which have the same 43mm threads as this lens).
_________________________________________________
NOTES:
* Taken in JPEG.
* Shot with the EOS M6.
* All are Handheld.
* All were taken with a circular polarizer filter.
* All are taken at f/1.4
* No crops.
* Minimal editing - I don't have time to play with these today (sorry!)
* No sharpening during PP  (in-camera JPEG sharpening only).
* Very slight noise reduction was used on two images with bees.
_________________________________________________

Local gardens on my street.  I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

Giving me the finger?

These are so brightly colored in real life that I was worried the camera would be unable to register the colors.

A four-image merge showing a bee retreating out of frame.

Very subtle noise reduction applied here but probably not necessary.

This was the first shot I took. Surprising details on the caterpillar... though the neighbor wont like how this Hungry, Hungry Caterpillar was shredding her flowers.

Liquid Amber seed pods- You can see some Bokeh-Swirl in this shot.

The tiniest of Cherry Blossoms.... these flowers were about 2cm across. I almost didn't take this shot.

This native bee is one 6th the size of a honey bee. Very tiny. We have 1500 species of native bees in Australia and only 10 are sting-less... so I wasn't going to try to find out if this was one. I was surprsed how sharp this was since it was almost too small to see on the LCD.

Native Flower opening

The source of my allergies?

Bees are always a difficult subject to capture.

Spring is here at last.

Native "Australian Minor Bird" feeding on nectar.

Bees always love lavender.

Always a delight to see no "banding" with these focal lengths when using a CPL

.
I found the lens easy to use. More so now that it wasn't raining like it was yesterday. But as I was returning home, I was photographing a wasp and accidentally got tuna oil and butter (from a sandwich I'd just eaten) smeared across the new filter with my thumb. Stupid, I know. But these new filters have an 'oleophobic coating' that rejects moisture and oils if you accidentally do what I just did ... and it wiped off instantly when I got home and cleaned it with a microfiber cloth. These filters also have multi coatings for optical enhancement as well. The images simply seemed sharper than I was expecting but that's more likely from the lens than anything the filter could have done. I'll get around to putting together a thread on CPL filters on EOS M lenses after the weekend.
.

An oily smear from my thumb after lunch... which was wiped off easily..
It's only Day 2 for me with this lens but so far it's an interesting lens that seems fairly versatile so far. The image quality is very good... nice and sharp... but the shallow DOF is exactly what I expected and it's MUCH stronger than the EF-M 22mm f/2 STM lens is capable of.  Hope these are of use to someone.
--
Regards,
Marco Nero.

Thanks for posting these shots Marco.

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Awesome photos, Marco! Love the one with flying bees:)

It looks like a great lens. Compare to my Sigma — compact and lighter, better CA control on 1.4, slightly less sharpness and busier bokeh in highlights. I saw on some other photos that bokeh at f/5.6 and up is losing its roundness. Can you confirm it?

Photato wrote:

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Local gardens on my street. I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

.
It's interesting to see what people's thoughts are on this new lens.  You're welcome to dissect any images that I post because that's why I posted them.  Everyone's opinion is welcome and valid.  What do you find "messy" about the bokeh in the image above? I'm genuinely curious as to what your thoughts are here because that first image has very smooth bokeh.  Remember that this is an f/1.4 lens with a 32mm (51mm equiv) lens which isn't really going to be pushing bokeh as far as other bright lenses are capable of. But this is a fairly extreme example of a diffused background. Bokeh balls are just one aspect of Bokeh and aren't necessary required in an image in order to claim bokeh status.
.
Wikipedia has quoted other photographers here but Bokeh is defined (approximately) as the "aesthetic quality of the blur produced in the out-of-focus parts of an image produced by a lens".  You felt that this background (in the image above) isn't particularly appealing because it appears to be "messy". 
.
There's an article here on good and bad bokeh which might be of interest to some: photographylife.com/what-is-bokeh 
.
I'm seeing very smooth transitional detail, similar to a shot I took outdoors on a sunny day with the EOSM and the EF 135mm f/2 USM lens ... and that's a lens well respected for bokeh (one of the so-called 'Holy Trinity' of Canon Primes, if I'm not mistaken).
.

A very similar bokeh produced by the EOS M + EF 135mm f/2 USM lens - a lens that is considered to be one of the best bokeh generating lenses from the Canon prime series.

.
If you're referring to "messy bokeh", I'd be inclined to think you're referring to either "nervous bokeh" or something similar.
.
"Bad Bokeh" is usually defined as a defocused background with sharp edges and an unattractive look to the image.  Each lens renders bokeh differently.  This 32mm lens can certainly produce bokeh balls although it readily produces "cat eye" bokeh, something that even the top Canon Bokeh lenses like the EF 85mm f/1.2 USM II lens can readily produce. 
.

Elliptical and Cat-Eye bokeh from the EF 85mm f/1.2L USM II lens on a Full Frame DSLR.  This is related to the falloff at the edges of the lens at specific distances to the primary subject or focus target.

The same type of 'Cat-Eye' bokeh from the EF-M 32mm f/1.4 STM lens.

Round bokeh from the same EF-M 32mm f/1.4 STM lens.
.
The bokeh from the EF-M 32mm f/1.4 STM lens is perfectly decent, if my own observations are to be taken into consideration.  Quality is going to be dependent on several factors within any given scene, but I think it's well controlled and appears to be rendering exactly the way that Canon executives expected it to.  Canon was toting this as a lens that was designed to render attractive bokeh, presumably to draw more attention to the M-series camera platform and to appeal to existing EOS M owners.

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Local gardens on my street. I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

.
It's interesting to see what people's thoughts are on this new lens. You're welcome to dissect any images that I post because that's why I posted them. Everyone's opinion is welcome and valid. What do you find "messy" about the bokeh in the image above? I'm genuinely curious as to what your thoughts are here because that first image has very smooth bokeh. Remember that this is an f/1.4 lens with a 32mm (51mm equiv) lens which isn't really going to be pushing bokeh as far as other bright lenses are capable of. But this is a fairly extreme example of a diffused background. Bokeh balls are just one aspect of Bokeh and aren't necessary required in an image in order to claim bokeh status.

I think it has to do with this lens not having rounded blades but instead a 7 blade diaphragm, an heptagon aperture. Similar to EF- M-22mm lens 7 blades.
Ironically, some smartphones have better bokeh than this given the perfectly rounded edge aperture (a simple metal ring with no moving parts).

I guess for the intended market this 32mm lens is not bad, every other aspects like vignetting, sharpness and chromatic aberrations seem to be very good though.

But the bokeh is meh. IMO

Photato wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Local gardens on my street. I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

I think it has to do with this lens not having rounded blades but instead a 7 blade diaphragm, an heptagon aperture. Similar to EF- M-22mm lens 7 blades.
Ironically, some smartphones have better bokeh than this given the perfectly rounded edge aperture (a simple metal ring with no moving parts).

The bokeh produced by modern smart-phones (eg iPhone7+) is completely artificial.  It's generated inside the camera's processor and they can even feed real-time fake-DOF to the display prior to the images being taken.

I guess for the intended market this 32mm lens is not bad, every other aspects like vignetting, sharpness and chromatic aberrations seem to be very good though.

But the bokeh is meh. IMO

I've bought quite a number of my EF lenses for their bokeh, including the 24L, 50L, 85L, 100L, 135L and 100-400L II lenses from the EF family.  These lenses all excel with their ability to generate bokeh and to present it in a predictable and pleasing manner.
.
I think the bokeh from this lens (EF 32mm f/1.4 STM) is excellent for the focal length and aperture.  I would have preferred a 9-blade iris like the EF lenses have... but the aperture is still f/1.4 and it's pretty darned sharp even when wide open.  It's presenting precisely the amount of bokeh that we predicted this lens would produce.  But that's not the reason to consider buying or using this lens... the usefulness in very low light is where it comes alive.  This is a bright lens.  It was designed to be versatile in lowlight and the bokeh (which I find to be 'just right' for this lens) is simply a beneficial side-effect from the lens design and aperture range.  I presume you'll be skipping this lens if you don't like it.

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Local gardens on my street. I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

I think it has to do with this lens not having rounded blades but instead a 7 blade diaphragm, an heptagon aperture. Similar to EF- M-22mm lens 7 blades.
Ironically, some smartphones have better bokeh than this given the perfectly rounded edge aperture (a simple metal ring with no moving parts).

The bokeh produced by modern smart-phones (eg iPhone7+) is completely artificial. It's generated inside the camera's processor and they can even feed real-time fake-DOF to the display prior to the images being taken.

I'm talking about the optical DoF that shows in in extreme close ups with small sensors. Canon has also P&S with fixed diaphragms and perfectly rounded iris so the bokeh in the rare occasions that it shows is really silky smooth.

I guess for the intended market this 32mm lens is not bad, every other aspects like vignetting, sharpness and chromatic aberrations seem to be very good though.

But the bokeh is meh. IMO

I've bought quite a number of my EF lenses for their bokeh, including the 24L, 50L, 85L, 100L, 135L and 100-400L II lenses from the EF family. These lenses all excel with their ability to generate bokeh and to present it in a predictable and pleasing manner.

I guess you mean shallow DoF, bokeh is the "quality" of the out of focus areas.

.
I think the bokeh from this lens (EF 32mm f/1.4 STM) is excellent for the focal length and aperture. I would have preferred a 9-blade iris like the EF lenses have... but the aperture is still f/1.4 and it's pretty darned sharp even when wide open. It's presenting precisely the amount of bokeh that we predicted this lens would produce. But that's not the reason to consider buying or using this lens... the usefulness in very low light is where it comes alive. This is a bright lens. It was designed to be versatile in lowlight and the bokeh (which I find to be 'just right' for this lens) is simply a beneficial side-effect from the lens design and aperture range. I presume you'll be skipping this lens if you don't like it.

Don't get me wrong, it is a bright high quality lens which only fault I see is the bokeh, not bad but no silky smooth.
I wonder how it stack against the EF 35mm IS since the price is roughly the same and unlike the 32mm it has OIS and is compatible with the R mount.

Photato wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

Photato wrote:

The sharpness looks good but unfortunately the Bokeh is some shots looks messy, like in the first sample and some others.

Local gardens on my street. I was able to blow the background out much more than this by getting closer to the flower ...but this shot was visually more interesting to me.

I think it has to do with this lens not having rounded blades but instead a 7 blade diaphragm, an heptagon aperture. Similar to EF- M-22mm lens 7 blades.
Ironically, some smartphones have better bokeh than this given the perfectly rounded edge aperture (a simple metal ring with no moving parts).

The bokeh produced by modern smart-phones (eg iPhone7+) is completely artificial. It's generated inside the camera's processor and they can even feed real-time fake-DOF to the display prior to the images being taken.

I'm talking about the optical DoF that shows in in extreme close ups with small sensors. Canon has also P&S with fixed diaphragms and perfectly rounded iris so the bokeh in the rare occasions that it shows is really silky smooth.

I guess for the intended market this 32mm lens is not bad, every other aspects like vignetting, sharpness and chromatic aberrations seem to be very good though.

But the bokeh is meh. IMO

I've bought quite a number of my EF lenses for their bokeh, including the 24L, 50L, 85L, 100L, 135L and 100-400L II lenses from the EF family. These lenses all excel with their ability to generate bokeh and to present it in a predictable and pleasing manner.

I guess you mean shallow DoF, bokeh is the "quality" of the out of focus areas.

.
I think the bokeh from this lens (EF 32mm f/1.4 STM) is excellent for the focal length and aperture. I would have preferred a 9-blade iris like the EF lenses have... but the aperture is still f/1.4 and it's pretty darned sharp even when wide open. It's presenting precisely the amount of bokeh that we predicted this lens would produce. But that's not the reason to consider buying or using this lens... the usefulness in very low light is where it comes alive. This is a bright lens. It was designed to be versatile in lowlight and the bokeh (which I find to be 'just right' for this lens) is simply a beneficial side-effect from the lens design and aperture range. I presume you'll be skipping this lens if you don't like it.

Don't get me wrong, it is a bright high quality lens which only fault I see is the bokeh, not bad but no silky smooth.
I wonder how it stack against the EF 35mm IS since the price is roughly the same and unlike the 32mm it has OIS and is compatible with the R mount.

I have both (and had the original 35 F1.4L). I love the 35 F2 IS on my 7DII, and have shot two bar mitzvahs with it, with very pleasing results. I have used the 35 on my M and M6, and so didn't really need the 32, but I really like the smaller form factor. I would say the 32 is even sharper than the 35, which is itself a terrific performer. Although I would also prefer the 32 to have IS, I wouldn't want it to be much bigger and heavier than it is. I don't know whether the addition of IS would have added a lot to the weight or size, but it seems likely that it would. The 35 F2 IS is certainly a lot bigger and heavier than the earlier 35 F2. Because I use the 35, and expect to use the 32, a lot for people shots, IS is less important to me. People move a lot, even when they are trying to keep still. I like to keep the shutter speed up to at least 1/100, and often faster, for people. At this focal length, and for my uses, the extra stop of the 32 F1.4 is far more useful than the IS of the 35 F2. As for bokeh, that's clearly highly subjective. For what it's worth, from what I've seen of the bokeh in my shots, and Marco's, and the others posted here, I don't find it meh at all. I think it's about as pleasing as you can expect from this focal length. It's certainly at least as good as what I remember getting from my 35 F1.4L. That's not scientific, of course. As I said, judgments about bokeh quality are highly subjective.

Photato wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

I've bought quite a number of my EF lenses for their bokeh, including the 24L, 50L, 85L, 100L, 135L and 100-400L II lenses from the EF family. These lenses all excel with their ability to generate bokeh and to present it in a predictable and pleasing manner.

I guess you mean shallow DoF, bokeh is the "quality" of the out of focus areas.

No, I definitely mean the bokeh.  Shallow DOF is one thing but the Bokeh is another thing altogether...   Here's a sample from each of those lenses (below) to illustrate why I'm referring to Bokeh and not just 'shallow DOF'.  All are clear examples of Bokeh.
.

24mmL

50mmL

85mmL

100mmL

135mmL

100-400mmL II

Nice photos, nice bokeh. Thanks for testing and showing samples.

Ulan wrote:

Nice photos, nice bokeh. Thanks for testing and showing samples.

Thanks Ulan.  I just took 3450 photographs with this lens over the last two days. I have one more day of shooting tomorrow.  I'm still reviewing the images but this is undoubtedly the sharpest lens I have ever used.  It even seems sharper than the EF 35mm f/1.4 USM II lens.  I'm astonished at the image quality... will try to get some images up for a proper lens review shortly.    I have so many "keepers" from this lens that it's going to be hard to pick which ones to select for upload.
.

Taken yesterday in Sydney Harbor

Marco Nero wrote:

I just took 3450 photographs with this lens over the last two days. I have one more day of shooting tomorrow. I'm still reviewing the images but this is undoubtedly the sharpest lens I have ever used. It even seems sharper than the EF 35mm f/1.4 USM II lens. I'm astonished at the image quality...

Wow! Now that is impressive. Especially considering all of your L lenses. Eager to see your review, Marco.

John TF wrote:

Marco Nero wrote:

I just took 3450 photographs with this lens over the last two days. I have one more day of shooting tomorrow. I'm still reviewing the images but this is undoubtedly the sharpest lens I have ever used. It even seems sharper than the EF 35mm f/1.4 USM II lens. I'm astonished at the image quality...

Wow! Now that is impressive. Especially considering all of your L lenses. Eager to see your review, Marco.

It's a very surprising lens. I didn't expect it to be capable of rendering such crisp detail at essentially any distance at all. Shots of detailed scenes with trees and construction buildings in the distance are just perfectly clear. I took a number of shots with P-Mode to see how the lens responds to the hands of a typical "tourist" and it produced nothing but sharp images. Color is particularly pleasant with this lens. For closeups it's surprising because you get consistently good images with soft, defocused backgrounds. I can see this lens being popular based on both the IQ and also the detail with narrower apertures... as well as the flattering shallow DOF and pleasant bokeh. I'll probably repost these three images later but here's a sample of what I caught... (there are handheld JPEGs with NO sharpening added in PP). I'll put them here because I used a CPL filter with each of these... hence the more saturated colors.
.

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f1.4 STM lens - Complete stranger posing for me yesterday.  I was curious to see if I could get any shallow DOF with a shot like this.

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f1.4 STM lens - Tried to steal my hotdog at lunch today.

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f1.4 STM lens - great clarity.

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f1.4 STM lens

EOS M6 + EF-M 32mm f1.4 STM lens - my companion at breakfast today. Check out the detail up close.
--
Regards,
Marco Nero.

Your impressions are certainly well demonstrated in each of those images. Most impressive. Thanks.