Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/12/29

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Subject: RE: [Leica] Bokeh controversy
From: "Dan Honemann" <ddh@home.com>
Date: Fri, 29 Dec 2000 08:08:29 -0500

Some very good observations by Johnny D. on bokeh and the 50 summilux vs.
Voigtlander Nokton from the archives; felt it worth reprinting here (feel
free to delete and move on if you disagree :)).

Dan

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Date:	Sat, 22 Apr 2000 22:36:30 +0100
From:	Johnny Deadman <deadman@jukebox.demon.co.uk>
Subject:	[Leica] nokton v. summilux first impressions

[...big snip...]

Fourth, and the biggest difference, bokeh. The problem with the Nokton for
me is that the out-of-focus (OOF) detail just looked ugly. I found the same
thing with the Minolta Rokkor 28. In a 1.4 lens your OOF areas need to look
good. Bokeh is tremendously hard to describe, but one of the effects of this
in the Nokton is that (to me) it draws attention to the OOF areas. In the
Leica lens, however, the bokeh is very good. Nearfield areas have that
familiar 'glow' while the distant field has a complex bokeh which I think is
probably some 'ni-sen' variation (ie it renders out-of-focus straight lines
as two lines to a greater or lesser extent). For example, the Nokton will
render a point highlight in the bg as a round white disk with a quite sharp
fall off, whereas the Leica will render it as a disk with a slight halo,
like a fuzzy donut.

The difference this makes is quite surprising to me. The Summilux appears to
have more of the picture in focus because (key point) the transition from
in-focus to out-of-focus is less obvious. Pictures with the Leica lens look
'sweet'. That's the only way I can describe it (but will post examples soon
on my Human Traffic site). The Nokton's bokeh is, I am afraid, 'grubby'...
mainly I think because it has quite a high edge contrast. Not blurry bokeh
at all.

You might guess from this 'review' that I think the lenses are pretty close.
Well, I don't. The Leica wins hands down for me, simply because the out of
focus areas look 'right' to me and with the Nokton they don't. Of course,
this is a personaly opinion and you may just think it's another Leica idiot
convincing himself he can count angels on the head of a pin, but I don't
think that's the case. Anyway, will put up some pix shortly and you can
judge for yourselves.
Hope this helps...

- - --
Johnny Deadman
photos:      http://www.pinkheadedbug.com
music:       http://www.jukebox.demon.co.uk