Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/08/28
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]I hope you're not referring to me as not caring about bokeh, that was a previous poster. I love the stuff. Mark Rutledge - ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Brownlow" <john@pinkheadedbug.com> To: "LUG" <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us> Sent: Monday, August 28, 2000 1:11 AM Subject: Re: [Leica] Bokeh vs. Nukeh > on 27/8/00 11:07 pm, Mark Rutledge at markrut@ticnet.com wrote: > > > Maybe bokeh has more to do with the "art" aspect of photography rather than > > the technical side. Emotion vs quantifiability. Images (painting, photos..) > > can move us in a way we cannot describe...beauty isn't measurable. Just a > > guess! > > I think bokeh is pretty measurable. Just no-one measures it yet. It's pretty > simple. You just look at the way the lens renders out of focus point sources > at various distances. You measure the light intensity from the centre of > the point outwwards along a radius. This spread function defines the bokeh > of the lens, to a VERY good first approximation, since any image cam ne > considered as a collection of point sources. > > That's it. Period. It's not difficult, complicated or airy fairy. > > The corollary of this is that a simple test for a lens' bokeh, as anyone who > cares about it knows, is to look at out of focus specular highlights. > Diffuse circles = creamy bokeh. Hard edged circles = sharp transitions in > the out of focus areas (is there a word for this?). Donut shapes (bright > rings) = pronounced Ni-Sen bokeh, very painterly and textural, like the lux > 50. > > You don't care about bokeh? Fine. But my point of view is that a > photographer should be in charge of every element of his/her craft. Grain, > tonality, sharpness, bokeh and so on. Of course everyone knows the picture > comes first. But photography is a craft as well as an art. > > Why do I care? I just developed twenty five rolls. Pretty much all of it was > shot wide open on either the 35/1.4 or the TE 90/2.8. I have way more stuff > out of focus than in focus. Thank God for nice bokeh! > > > -- > Johnny Deadman > > http://www.pinkheadedbug.com > > >