Re: [Leica] WAS: Bokeh'm somebody, naw nuke it! ;-)

["Mike Durling" <durling@widomaker.com>]

In my youth ( I was about 12 ) I got a darkroom kit.  I mostly made contact
prints but I occasionally got brave and tried the old Federal enlarger that
came with the kit.  I never could get sharp prints.  I thought it was just
me.  Eventually I learned to stop it down to about F-22 and with several
minute exposure times the prints were reasonably sharp.

I ended up replacing the enlarger when I got serious and one day I decided
to clean its lens.  When I put it back together I couldn't remember which
way the middle element went in.  I guessed and tried the lens and what do
you know, I had it backwards and it was sharp!  It was wrong all those
years.

Here's a photo:  http://www.widomaker.com/~durling/photo/darkroom1.jpg

Mike D

- ----- Original Message -----
From: "S Dimitrov" <sld@earthlink.net>
To: <leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us>
Sent: Friday, July 13, 2001 12:01 AM
Subject: Re: [Leica] WAS: Bokeh'm somebody, naw nuke it! ;-)


> I had a Bokeh moment of sorts today. As I was waiting for a car part, I
> took the time out to clean the viewing lens of a Rollei. I inadvertently
> turned the center element around in the process of reassembly. When I
> looked through the finder, I realized my mistake. The image quality from
> the diffusion was enough to pique my interest. I'm tempted to get a
> lowly Summitar and experiment with turning around an element at a time
> to see what I get.
>
> Slobodan Dimitrov
>
>
>
> Ray Moth wrote:
> >
> > Ted Grant wrote:
> >
> > So before any of you who've just learned this bohek word and effect for
> >
> > the first time don't sweat it, forget it, go take your pictures with
> > the
> > innocents of yesterday, have fun without the bokeh dilemma! :-) :-)
> >
> > It don't mean nuthin' anyway! ;-)
> >
> > =======================================================================
> >
> > Ted,
> >
> > I agree that the concept of bokeh can be overemphasized and that, in
> > many cases, it's of no consequence. Two things I'd like to say,
> > however:
> >
> > 1. The importance of bokeh depends a lot on one's type of photography.
> > For example, both wildlife and portrait photography can be enhanced by
> > good bokeh or can be marred by the lack thereof.
> >
> > 2. Most high quality lenses (especially Leica) render good bokeh so
> > it's usually a non-issue. However, there are still some "dogs" out
> > there and, if you see a picture with significant out-of-focus areas
> > taken using a lens with ugly bokeh, it's not a pretty sight!
> >
> > Just MHO.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > =====
> > Ray
> >
> > "The trouble with resisting temptation is
> >  you never know when you'll get another chance!"
> >
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