Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2002/01/01
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Henry Ting <henryting10@yahoo.com> wrote (edited): > This is going to be controversial. > I read about a lot of Leica lens offering a distinct > "Bokeh" image that's missing from lens of other makes. > I was confused as to how could this be possible, > unless outside of physics' existentialism, Leica lens > have a metaphysical spirit that the likes of Nikon or > Zeiss lack. > > To prove my point, I did some experiment. > I used my Leica M6 with the 35 Summicron and a Nikon > F2 with a 35mm lens. I set them up both on tripods > with the same camera to object distance in shooting my > car head on at a range of only 5 feet. The background > was a cul-de-sac of our neighborhood with florals and > houses and images that I am familiar with. > > The result? No differences whatsoever. I think the > reverse is true. If both lens are of the same focal > length, the graduality from sharpness to blurryness > should not be different at all. Based on the law of > physics this should apply to every lens. > I for once proved to myself there is no difference and > for anyone that claim there is a "Bokeh" difference > between Leica and Nikon lens, my only comment from > here onwards is "More power to them". Henry, you would need to take a series of photos with each lens--at various apertures and focused at various distances with a wide range of different objects at various distances in front of and behind the plane of focus--to really prove anything one way or the other. Personally I'm far too lazy to bother. :-) "Good bokeh" is something I usually don't notice, which IMO is as it should be. But I do take note of photos containing unpleasant out-of-focus areas. In my admittedly brief experience with an early 35mm f/2 Nikkor (non-AI version with knurled focusing ring) I found the lens to have pleasant, unobtrusive bokeh. Not as sharp as my old 35 Summicron however. OTOH the 35 f/1.4 Nikkor, which I own, is capable of harsh, ugly out-of-focus areas under the wrong circumstances, in particular in photos taken wide open and up close with detailed, contrasty objects just behind the plane-of-focus. It's also a very sharp lens. I use it almost exclusively for landscapes, stopped down and bokeh-less where it excels, so its OOF characteristics are of little importance to me. When I want lenses that perform well wide open and up close, combining sharpness with nice blur, I go with my 35, 50 and 90 Summicrons or 50 and 85 Zeiss Sonnars. (Or the 105 f/2.5 Nikkor, second SLR optical formula, if I'm using a Nikon.) This is just an empirical thing, a result of using all the gear I own over time in various situations. - -Dave- - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html