How about a definition for a returning.......

[Glen Barrington]

These guys are making that all up! It is actually the Japanese equivalent of Fahrvergnügen and it is pronounced exactly the way the Germans would pronounce it= [ˈfaːɐ̯.fɛɐ̯ˌɡnyːɡn̩].

These guys will tell you anything, I mean ANYTHING!
--
I'm so bright, my father calls me son.

Now that you've judged the quality of my typing, take a look at my photos. . .
http://www.jpgmag.com/people/glenbarrington/photos

 

[Deleted1929]

Fahrvergnügen

Google translate comes up with "Driving Pleasure" for this word.

Hard to see the connection with "Bokeh".

--
StephenG

 

[antoineb]

obviously "bokeh" has nothing to do with digital or analog - it started existing as soon as there existed cameras with shallow enough a depth of field to be able to photograph a portrait in front of some background, suitable put out of focus.

"bokeh" has just become more fashionable over the past couple decades, it happens to be a Japanese term and the Japanese happen to be avid photographers.

"fast" lenses using high-quality glass and with rounded aperture blades tend to produce smooth and pleasing bokeh. Whereas a lot of other lenses will produce bokeh that will suffer from various issues such as: too "nervous", out of focus highlights rendered in weird non-round geometric shapes, etc.

 

[sherwoodpete]

obviously "bokeh" has nothing to do with digital or analog - it started existing as soon as there existed cameras with shallow enough a depth of field to be able to photograph a portrait in front of some background, suitable put out of focus.

"bokeh" has just become more fashionable over the past couple decades, it happens to be a Japanese term and the Japanese happen to be avid photographers.

"fast" lenses using high-quality glass and with rounded aperture blades tend to produce smooth and pleasing bokeh. Whereas a lot of other lenses will produce bokeh that will suffer from various issues such as: too "nervous", out of focus highlights rendered in weird non-round geometric shapes, etc.

I think the roundness or otherwise of the aperture blades is just one small part of the effect.

An ideal (theoretical) out of focus point will be rendered as a uniformly-bright circle of confusion, or blur disk. In reality, the edges are often brighter than the main body of the disk. This tends to emphasise the existence of each disk. It might be preferred to deviate from the ideal in the opposite direction, where instead of emphasising the edges, instead there is a gentle softening or fading of the edges. This is much more rare.

Often a lens which is praised for its quality, in delivering very sharp images, may also have the unhappy side-effect of harsh, sharp-edged circles of confusion, and so the image as a whole may not be pleasing except where in focus.

Regards,
Peter

 

[Justaposter]

It's referring to the quality of the out of focus areas in a photograph.

 

[Doug MacMillan]

Lens design and aperture make up the elements that create good or bad bokeh.

I once tested three lenses in a real world situation: An El-Nikkor 90mm, a Canon FD 100mm and a Leica Summicron 90mm. I shot photos at f4 to introduce the lens iris in the test. I made 11x14 B&W prints from all three, being very careful to match the prints from a contrast and density standpoint. I then had friends and family, photographers and non-photographers, judge which photo the considered most "pleasing".

The overwhelming choice was the Summicron, although if you looked closely, the El-Nikkor appeared slightly sharper. They rated the Canon second and the Nikon third. I've used either Leica or Canon because I find the look of their lenses more pleasing. Many Nikon lenses create what I consider ugly bokeh.

I don't remember how many blades are in the Summicron iris, but since it doesn't stop down with every exposure, they can use many more than possible with a SLR. When you look at the iris, it's a perfect circle at all apertures.

 

[antoineb]

of course it did also cost markedly more than my enthusiast DSLR body

 

[nelsonal]

Splitting hairs again, if a term requires an adjective like good or unpleasant (which is how bokeh seems to always be used), than it probably isn't refering to the level of goodness or badness of a thing and is far more likely to be refering to the thing.

If bokeh really did mean the quality of the blur, what's termed good bokeh would be termed something like it has bokeh or it has a lot of bokeh, while what's termed unpleasant bokeh would be termed it has no or is without bokeh.

 

[sherwoodpete]

Lens design and aperture make up the elements that create good or bad bokeh.

I once tested three lenses in a real world situation: An El-Nikkor 90mm, a Canon FD 100mm and a Leica Summicron 90mm. I shot photos at f4 to introduce the lens iris in the test. I made 11x14 B&W prints from all three, being very careful to match the prints from a contrast and density standpoint. I then had friends and family, photographers and non-photographers, judge which photo the considered most "pleasing".

The overwhelming choice was the Summicron, although if you looked closely, the El-Nikkor appeared slightly sharper. They rated the Canon second and the Nikon third. I've used either Leica or Canon because I find the look of their lenses more pleasing. Many Nikon lenses create what I consider ugly bokeh.

I don't remember how many blades are in the Summicron iris, but since it doesn't stop down with every exposure, they can use many more than possible with a SLR. When you look at the iris, it's a perfect circle at all apertures.

Thanks for your comments.

This has already been posted in this forum, but it's worth another mention.

An article from Zeiss, "Depth of Field and Bokeh" by H. H. Nasse (1.96MB download).

http://www.zeiss.com/c12567a8003b8b6f/embedtitelintern/cln_35_bokeh_en/%24file/cln35_bokeh_en.pdf

It covers both the shape of the aperture and the effect of lens aberrations on the appearance, with technical explanations as well as illustrations / sample images.

Regards,
Peter

 

[citizenlouie]

Thanks for the Zeiss article. Though rather difficult to understand, but I kind of get it why some of my lenses are my favorites. All my 4/3 lenses have circular 9-blade aperture diaphragms, and that's why their bokeh quality is really difficult to pick fault. My Olympus OM mount Zuiko 135mm f/2.8, not the sharpest lens I have, but renders beautiful bokeh, and I kind of understand the reason with the info the article describes. OM Zuiko 50mm f/3.5 macro, I couldn't quite pinpoint why I like that lens either, and now sort of get an idea (that lens is both sharp like a macro lens should be and have soft out-of-focus rendition like a portrait lens). Both OM lenses are inexpensive because of their specs (not the fastest lenses around, and very easy to find on eBay), but the way they render images are pretty magical. I also have OM Zuiko 50mm f/2 macro, and its rendition is very technical (i.e., superior), but doesn't have that magical soft-touch to the bokeh of the cheaper 50mm f/3.5. The latter gives Leica glow to the image, despite it's a cheap lens (~$60), and the fruit close-ups I shot have that "fleshy looking" soft touch while the subject remains to be sharp. A very good lens, but only cheap because it's f/3.5 (I think it even has floating element inside for close focus correction).

 

[Pedagydusz]

Continuing to split hairs, I think that you would be right, if the "quality" was unidimensional. But I usually see discussions of the type "a bit harsh", "smooth, but with an elongation of the highlights", "doughnut shaped circles", etc. which somehow create a need for qualifying. But otherwise, I agree with you.
--
Antonio

http://ferrer.smugmug.com/

 

[jack1000]

that site says the STF came out in 1999, and I was absolutely convinced there was a much earlier lens with out-of-focus control ... unless my memory is playing tricks on me!

You might be thinking of the Canon EF 135mm f/2.8 Soft Focus lens. It was introduced in 1987. But its special control wasn't to control the out-of-focus area. It was to control the overall softness of the image (to give a diffused look to your pictures).

Thanks both for the suggestion - no, I think it was Minolta, and it definitely had some kind of adjustable control of out-of-focus quality - it's stuck in my mind because I remember how the journalist had to struggle to define it without a word for it! The Minolta STF lens sounds like it.

I had thought it was much earlier than that ... either there was an earlier version (maybe only released in Japan?), or perhaps more likely I have just completely misremembered when I read about it!