Steve Hamley said:
But apparently all Leica lenses were not created equal. If you look at one of Cartier-Bressson's famous shots of Albert Camus, you'll see some very nasty bokeh. Look at the bright stuff in the background.
http://www.2idiotsinaboat.com/pilgrim/media/camus.jpg
Steve
I know what you mean because they were hand-made. But generally speaking, an old non-Ai 50mm F1.4 Nikkor lens, which tend to produce the blurry part a little jazzier/noisier than a collapsible 50mm F2 Smmicron. However, old Nikkor 105mm F2.5 macro is an exception for its outstanding quality, which I've never used but seen the results every once in a while.
But the point is when you take a pciture, that is only one moment and that's it. It's so spontaneous, so it's almost pointless to discuss especially in the field of photo journalism.
Look at the famous picture of Marc Riboud, of a girl holding a flower in front of police guards in an anti-war demonstration, the depth of field is so shallow in that image and the background is so blurry, and that takes up a large part of the picture. Is it a good bokeh? No, it isn't for me. I don't know what kind of lens he used to get this shot, but I bet that was not his top priority. But does the bokeh question come across my mind when I see the picture? No, unless someone is whispering to my ear about the bokeh/blur quality. It's almost irrelevant.
This is a bit off-topic, but to make an analogy here, you can look at the preference of animal and fish meat. Japanese tend to like them with fair amount of fat in it, on the other hand, Americans and Europeans go for lean meat only. I think the Japanese think fat is a flavor and adds more flavor to the rest of the meat, so they keep it.
Although this probably has a lot to do with their diet, I'm almost led to believe that the Japanese want more little, tiny, and extra flavors and textures in their food or whatever, and that's considered to be the culture here.
And I think the same thing can be said about the texture of the blur in the photographs. Especially if you're doing still life or want to do a macro shot of a flower or something that's hardly moving and changing to your eye, then you have time to test out different lenses.
I mean, in a sense of Japanese bokeh style, it seems bokeh is sometimes more important than a subject for a macro shot. I'm being a bit sarcastic, but that's kind of what I see sometimes.
