Well, I'll also vote for the Rodenstock APO Sironar S or N. For those of you who don't have the March/April 1997 issue of Photo Techniques lying around, a feel like a little homework on the Bokeh issue, here are a few sites -- some of which have the illustrations Ken was looking for:
Although large format lenses are not included in the series of tests, this site compares a lot of lenses. Specular highlights make for quick and effective comparison.
Many thanks for the heads-up. I will try to make some tests, and watch out for the "oatmealy look" - especially as I make more portraits.
Although large format lenses are not included in the series of tests, this site compares a lot of lenses. Specular highlights make for quick and effective comparison.
Many thanks for the heads-up. I will try to make some tests, and watch out for the "oatmealy look" - especially as I make more portraits.
I'm not wild about sites that post an eye-popping catalog of contrived test images, like the specular highlight stuff, or that purport to characterize the behavior of a lens with one or two pictures. Yes, they can tell you something if you know what you're looking for, but bokeh behavior can be quite complex, and what really matters is how a lens behaves in making the pictures you want to make across the range of situations you're likely to use it in, and the best test of that is to use it yourself in those situations.
If you're new to this, the best way to get a sense of what the issue is, is to photograph a range of scenes using the identical focal length from different lens lines with substantially different character. Don't go looking for oatmeal, or for anything else in particular, and don't go enlarging small portions of the picture showing OOF backgrounds or specular highlights. Just print the whole picture, as you would do normally, and the look at the paired prints side by side, very carefully. Look at how different parts of the picture, at different degrees of defocus, behave under different circumstances. You'll reach your own conclusions about what you like and what you don't, or conclude that it doesn't matter to you at all. If you do find that this is something to which you're sensitive, this sort of exercise provides a good foundation for being able to evaluate other lenses later on, without having to run a full comparison test each time, because you'll know what you need to look for. For me, the critical test is watching how trees and foliage fuzz out at different degrees of defocus, and more generally the extent to which coherence of form is maintained as you move gradually away from the plane of focus; for you it might be something else.
I see on your website that you mention having a 150 Apo-Sironar-S. In the absence of a direct comparator to one of your Fujinons, I'd go take a bunch of pictures with that lens. Put it on your 8x10, for that matter - it won't cover to the corners, but you'll still get a nice, big picture to evaluate. Take portraits, trees, whatever you normally like to take.
for kicks i just mounted a camera on a tripod and pointed it at an LED headlamp. got an idea how the schneider lenses render things out of focus. the 210 apo symmar appears to have perfectly corrected spherical aberration (interpreting the results according to one of those websites) .... which means you'd expect neutral bokeh (neither harsh nor orgasmic) both in front and in back of the plane of focus. It rendered the light as an evenly illuminated disk, without hard edges, in both cases. The 120 super angulon was about the same, but put a harder edge on the disk at wide apertures.
I tried the same test with my borrowed hasselblad (old lens) and a nikon, but it's much harder to evaluate when you can't put a loupe on the ground glass.
For example purposes, the following I believe is a nice portrait with bokeh which was made with a "sharp" LF lens- 210mm Red Dot Artar @ f16. http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?topic_id=1481&msg_id=00C7ar&photo_id=3341325&photo_sel_index=0
This is quite an interesting conversation about "bokeh".
But I have to add that I think someone is being unjustifiably hard on Fuji optics. Here's why:
I recently side by side "tested" a Docter Optic Germinar W 150mm f/9 and a Fujinon 150mm W/EBC (the six element, six group version) and can say a few things with ABSOLUTE certainty:
- There is no difference in the OOF areas between the two optics
- OOF rendition may (and please underscore "may") be influenced by the shape of the aperture. It certainly controls the shape of highlights.
If someone were to come to me and say that lens designers can influence and control the rendition of OOF areas, I'd asked for a physical explanation of how this is even possible! Actually, a friend did this once concerning the "bokeh" of Leica and Contax lenses for 35mm work. But there was NO verifiable objective evidence from the originators or even from lab testers of these optical implementations that showed anything like what was being suggested by my friend.
Bottom line: Yes, by all means take a close look at images if you're that neurotic about OOF rendition. Make your lens choice thereafter. But I have never seen anything like what's being suggested here. A good plasmat design is a good plasmat design. If the lens designers are good enough to control OOF rendition, I'd like to see their formulas and build instructions!
"f someone were to come to me and say that lens designers can influence and control the rendition of OOF areas, I'd asked for a physical explanation of how this is even possible! "
Did you read any of those links from earlier in the thread? Take a close look at the ones that discuss correction for spherical aberration.
Based on contemporary literature, the Voigtländer Heliar was designed to "have an exceptionally pleasing transition from sharp areas to unsharp areas". That's as good a definition of "good bokeh" as any I've seen.
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