Saturday March 11, 2017

WARREN CONNECTICUT – This was a working inside kind of day – hanging pictures and cleaning out closets. I took a break from household drudgery to do a series of test images to assess the quality of the out of focus portions of the image (the quality of so-caled “bokeh”) for every 50mm lens that I own: a 1945 f1.5 Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar, a 1962 Leica f2.0 “rigid” Summicron, a modern Leica Summicron, a Summicron Asp. and an f.95 Leica Noctilux.

There was no clear winner but the rigid Summicron, Summicton Asp and Zeiss Sonnar excel, and the Noctilux has a very special character. In this context what I mean by “excel” is smooth transitions from the in focus and out of focus portions of the image, and a creamy quality in the latter. Images below are from the modern Summicron Asp. at f2.0 and the Noctilux at f.95.

Day 2,704 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.

On this day three years ago (day 1,608): Chambers Street