tbh.. i don't really understand the distinction between bokeh and dof for effect.. or is it the same thing?
Depth of Field refers simply to what range of distances are in focus. This is a somewhat rough definition, as it depends on how picky you are about what's sharp! Bokeh, as it was first popularized in photography refers to the manner in which out of focus elements are rendered. Depending on the lens design, things that are out of focus can appear rather different, and lenses that created particularly pleasing (and for sure not downright distracting) out of focus rendering were considered to have "good bokeh". (Here's someone's list of the 10 best lenses made today, though this is subjective). Nowadays the term has been used so generally that it doesn't mean much. A lens you will never see on the list is a mirror lens (also called catadioptic, or cat), as due to the round mirror blocking the middle of the lens it creates donut-shaped instead of circular blobs from out of focus points of light!
Sticking with the blur definition, not fuzzy dots and sticking with old Minolta SRT photos. My current camera doesn't go to a very small f-stop for controlling depth of field.
Like the color combination and form.. almost like an abstract
Agreed. I chose a theme that can be interpreted broadly to solicit a wide variety of contributions. In my opinion, the responses have been great so far, better than I imagined.
Yes, I agree. It's a good theme with different interpretations.
Sticking with the blur definition, not fuzzy dots and sticking with old Minolta SRT photos. My current camera doesn't go to a very small f-stop for controlling depth of field.
According to the Wiki definition at the bottom, they seem to be pretty much the same thing - it's kind of a neat word though The term "bokeh" apparently wasn't used (in the Western world at least) until the late 1990s, and seems to only be used in relation to digital cameras - especially when the background has those circles and/or hexagons of light - like in fractalv's first photo in this thread. I've seldom heard it used in reference to 35mm photography, though it could be. When I took photography courses in the '80s that sort of thing usually fell under controlling "depth of field" by manipulating the f-stop.
This photo was shot around 1985-86, with a Minolta SRT-100 - I guess the background could (now) be called "bokeh-effect"....?
Agreed. I chose a theme that can be interpreted broadly to solicit a wide variety of contributions. In my opinion, the responses have been great so far, better than I imagined.
