She says 1.4 bohka "is the best". ----

[NB23]

"Bokeh", "ThreeDeeNess". All Pukeh to me.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Back in the 90s, 50 1.8s and 50 1.4s were the kit lenses. They were on the camera because they were cheap

Now everyone fawns over them like its the second coming of Jesus
I used a 50 1.4 wide open for my Junior High photos of all my friends because it was too dark in the cafeteria and classrooms for anything slower

I wish I could have closed down for some of the group shots

In the 60s, 70s, and 80s the "kit" lens was a 50mm f: 1.7, 1.8, 1.9, or 2.0. The upgrade lens was the 1.4, the deluxe lens was 1.2. When at age 17 I got a brandy-new OM-2 I went for the 50/1.4. The lens just plain sucked any farther open than 2.8, and I now use 50mm/2.0 Nikkor H lenses from the 60s, which are useable wide open and just stunning at the other apertures.

I'm a watch collector and have never heard of "Wabi". I'm quite certain I don't need to. Today I'm carrying a Waltham 23j Vanguard (with diamond endstones throughout the escapement) 16s made the year the Titanic had that problem. Most modern watches are junk jewelry when compared to a decent RR watch anyway.

 

[David Brown]

... - the combination of youthful ignorance, inexperience, and absolute certainty.
A common affliction, followed some years later with a tendency to roll the eyes and smile wryly when reminded of it.

My 21st birthday. I may have had an attitude, or at least my family was trying to tell me something ...

 

[pcsaba1981]

Can somebody explain me when an out of focus image is considered beautiful and when it is not?

I use shallow DoF when I want to make attention onto the subject, who is usually my wife or my child . I usually don't take too much attention about the out of focus image (background).

So when bokeh is beautiful?

 

[Dali]

Can somebody explain me when an out of focus image is considered beautiful and when it is not?

I use shallow DoF when I want to make attention onto the subject, who is usually my wife or my child . I usually don't take too much attention about the out of focus image (background).

So when bokeh is beautiful?

I think it is considered as "beautiful" when it is not distracting... To me the concept is meaningless as I consider a picture as a whole and I am not willing to detail one part of it or an other unless the picture has no interest (but in this case I switch to something else).

 

[NB23]

My 21st birthday. I may have had an attitude, or at least my family was trying to tell me something ...

I LOVE This!!

 

[swittmann]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommyoshima

I love this guy's work.

Shallow DOF alone certainly does not make a good photo, agreed, but if it's used wisely and creatively - like in this case - I think it's great.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tommyoshima

I love this guy's work.

Shallow DOF alone certainly does not make a good photo, agreed, but if it's used wisely and creatively - like in this case - I think it's great.

I have no opinion of his work, but will just comment that I think when photography becomes about something technical framework, and that is used as an idea to create work, (wide open apertures is one of those technical things), then the photographer is on thin ice. That's a poor platform to base work on.

I'm not against someone using large or small apertures. But when I hear talk about it as if it's the whole idea of their work, then I very much mind. Surely there are better things to focus on, literally.

 

[benjiboy]

The fastest 50mm standard lens I own is a Canon FD 50 f1.4 and I have no desire for a 50mm lens that's any faster, however I do have a Canon FD 85mm f 1.2L portrait lens because portraits are my main interest that I bought new in the 1980's that I rarely use at full aperture because I.M.O. no lens gives it's best performance wide open it's against the laws of physics.

 

[E. von Hoegh]

I have no opinion of his work, but will just comment that I think when photography becomes about something technical framework, and that is used as an idea to create work, (wide open apertures is one of those technical things), then the photographer is on thin ice. That's a poor platform to base work on.

I'm not against someone using large or small apertures. But when I hear talk about it as if it's the whole idea of their work, then I very much mind. Surely there are better things to focus on, literally.

Using a wide aperture gives shallow DOF. The design of the lens determines the character of the out-of-focus areas ('OOFAs'). These are two different things. Since most all 50s for 35mm are double-Gauss designs, their OOFAs will be similar; differences will be due to the optimisation chosen as well as the degree of "retrofocality" of the lens in question. Lastly the shape of the aperture will determine the shape of out-of-focus highlights.
Usually when I hear or read someone babbling mindlessly about the "great bokeh" their lens has I translate it thusly:"I can't take a decent picture to save my life, so I read some nonsense on the internet and bought this lens which I'm now making an a$$ of myself with".

I learned that a wide aperture was useful to separate the subject from it's surroundings/background, as well as taking photos in poor light. But that was a long time ago, much has changed in 40 years.

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

Using a wide aperture gives shallow DOF. The design of the lens determines the character of the out-of-focus areas ('OOFAs'). These are two different things. Since most all 50s for 35mm are double-Gauss designs, their OOFAs will be similar; differences will be due to the optimisation chosen as well as the degree of "retrofocality" of the lens in question. Lastly the shape of the aperture will determine the shape of out-of-focus highlights.
Usually when I hear or read someone babbling mindlessly about the "great bokeh" their lens has I translate it thusly:"I can't take a decent picture to save my life, so I read some nonsense on the internet and bought this lens which I'm now making an a$$ of myself with".

I learned that a wide aperture was useful to separate the subject from it's surroundings/background, as well as taking photos in poor light. But that was a long time ago, much has changed in 40 years.

I know what you describe above, except lens design is not something I've ever studied.

You describe my point well. The idea behind the photograph shouldn't be about shallow depth of field, there has to be substance, otherwise what's the damned point?

 

[E. von Hoegh]

I know what you describe above, except lens design is not something I've ever studied.

You describe my point well. The idea behind the photograph shouldn't be about shallow depth of field, there has to be substance, otherwise what's the damned point?

Why not just take photos with nothing in focus?

 

[Klainmeister]

Why not just take photos with nothing in focus?

Hey! Check out my new F/2.8 pinhole camera!

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Hey! Check out my new F/2.8 pinhole camera!

You could sell those, I bet.

 

[GarageBoy]

Wabi sabi is the beauty of worn in/broken in objects - think of the leica geeks who go crazy over brassed black paint
In the watch world, it's lume that has yellowed with age, surface scratches, etc
One man's idea of wabi is another's idea of worn out junk

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Wabi sabi is the beauty of worn in/broken in objects - think of the leica geeks who go crazy over brassed black paint
In the watch world, it's lume that has yellowed with age, surface scratches, etc
One man's idea of wabi is another's idea of worn out junk

Whoops. Patina. I stand corrected, I did need to know about that - thank you - I thought it was some sort of "instant collectible" brand. The Rolex Milgauss I've had since new (in 1982, $562 in Switzerland) has plenty of Wabi sabi. Makes big time WW collectors sick. All my guns have it too.

 

[Prest_400]

Why not just take photos with nothing in focus?

I've got myopia and can assure it's a bit annoying. Plus the bokeh (in my eyes) is rather bad.
I don't know if they sell summiluxes that can mount on here...

I did have a short "Bokeh" period, thankfully Kodachrome distracted me from that. As it needed plenty of light, it did bring in bokeh too. Nowadays I find myself ocassionally using selective focus, but not in an exaggerated way.
My fastest lens is the classic 50mm 1.8. I'd love more aperture for the light gathering!

As of wabi-sabi, it reminded me of preworn/faded new jeans. I buy new solid indigo/black jeans and let them get worn.
I make fun of it by telling that you can always put 'em into the back of the van and let them drag down the road. Just as shown on brainiac (an UK science TV show)

 

[lxdude]

no lens gives it's best performance wide open it's against the laws of physics.

Nope. Not against the laws of physics.
In fact, a perfect lens, i.e., one without aberrations, has its resolution limited only by diffraction. The larger the aperture, the more the resolution. Every doubling of aperture diameter, e.g., f/8 to f/4, results in doubling of resolution.

It's just that in the real world things aren't as easy as that.

 

[Dr Croubie]

Nope. Not against the laws of physics.
In fact, a perfect lens, i.e., one without aberrations, has its resolution limited only by diffraction. The larger the aperture, the more the resolution. Every doubling of aperture diameter, e.g., f/8 to f/4, results in doubling of resolution.

It's just that in the real world things aren't as easy as that.

To elaborate a bit further, every real and theoretical lens gets more diffraction with narrower apertures, that's physics and there's no way around it. So opening wider, every lens gets sharper.
But at the same time, counteracting that, every real lens gets sharper by stopping down, because it removes a lot of abberations that exist in 'real' lenses.
Put the two together, and you get that typical 'hill' curve where stopping down first increases resolution (to f/5.6-8 or so), then stopping down it gets worse again. If you could build real lenses as well as theoretical ones, with f/1.0 and no abberations wide open, besides having to mortgage your house for it, it would only get sharper wider open and be the sharpest lens ever. (and then it would only get used by some nerds who sit in their basement and take photos of Imatest charts and drool over numbers)

 

[Bill Burk]

Can somebody explain me when an out of focus image is considered beautiful and when it is not?

I use shallow DoF when I want to make attention onto the subject, who is usually my wife or my child . I usually don't take too much attention about the out of focus image (background).

So when bokeh is beautiful?

Good, Neutral and Bad Bokeh is just a click away...

I like the simple illustration that when you take pictures of flowers using a lens with the "bad" halo-type bokeh, branches that are out of focus will still be sharp because the bright outlines will be sharply defined.

http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/bokeh.htm

Now, we all know good photographers work to reduce distractions in images. Our "job" is to remove soda cans from stream banks and pick up trash on the grass behind our subjects... We're supposed to straighten the folds of curtains and flick the stray hairs back from foreheads... So the idea of "Good Bokeh" which reduces distractions makes sense to me in that context.

But of course I personally do not do a good job removing distractions from my photographs, I am not likely to be able to capitalize on Good Bokeh...

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

I think it's a good idea to do what we can to make ALL of our pictures look their very best. We owe it to the arts, if nothing else.
I was shooting some portraits outdoors last month, and knew from experience that I need about f/8 for close-ups to have enough depth of field to be satisfying to my eye, while at the same time isolating the subjects from the background. My Summitar just works so well at f/5.6 or 8.
Had I opened up more, all the way to f/2, the background becomes too busy and distracting again, while focusing on the fly will be far more difficult.

If I focus at f/1.4 with a 50mm lens, and a full figure shot, I stand a chance at recording enough depth of field to have enough focus where it doesn't look terrible. But when I move in that DOF becomes narrower the closer I am to the subject. Why, then, not stop down enough for decent depth of field?

Anyway. Use your tools to fully explore the medium. Don't limit yourself.

 

[lxdude]

I was shooting some portraits outdoors last month, and knew from experience that I need about f/8 for close-ups to have enough depth of field to be satisfying to my eye, while at the same time isolating the subjects from the background. My Summitar just works so well at f/5.6 or 8.
Had I opened up more, all the way to f/2, the background becomes too busy and distracting again, while focusing on the fly will be far more difficult.

I'm sure just getting a portrait of a fly is difficult enough...

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

I'm sure just getting a portrait of a fly is difficult enough...

Touché. That was very poorly written. Can I blame not being a native English speaker, or should I just accept it?

 

[E. von Hoegh]

Touché. That was very poorly written. Can I blame not being a native English speaker, or should I just accept it?

No, that's not an excuse. When I was born, I couldn't speak at all - just drooled a lot and made gurgling and mewling noises - look at me now!

 

[Thomas Bertilsson]

No, that's not an excuse. When I was born, I couldn't speak at all - just drooled a lot and made gurgling and mewling noises - look at me now!

OK. I'll just suck it up then... haha