Everything you’ve ever wanted to know about bokeh and its history

There’s so much we can argue about when we talk about bokeh: whether we like it or not, when and how should it be used, what’s ‘good’ and what’s ‘bad bokeh’. In fact, different people even pronounce it differently. Still, it’s a fact that bokeh has become an integral part of photography talk and photography itself.

But how did we get there? What exactly is bokeh, when did it become a part of photography and how did it become so important?

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What is bokeh?

Bokeh refers to the quality of the out-of-focus or blurry points of light in a photo. It isn’t what you call the blur itself and it isn’t about the amount of blur in an image. While you usually see it mostly in the highlights in an image, it isn’t only about background blur. Bokeh can just as easily be used to talk about the quality of foreground blur, too.

How do you pronounce it?

Bokeh comes from the Japanese word boke (ボケ). It means ‘blur’ or ‘haze’. You pronounce it BOH-Kə or BOH-kay.

Lenses

It is your camera lens that is the key element when it comes to creating good bokeh.

The biggest impact on bokeh is the shape of the diaphragm blades (or aperture blades) of a lens. A lens with more circular blades will produce rounder and softer out-of-focus highlights. If a lens’ blades create a more hexagonal shape, then the bokeh will be more angular.

Generally speaking, rounder bokeh is considered more beautiful bokeh. That means you want a lens with more aperture blades. The more blades there are, the rounder the shape they create.

The faster the lens you can find, so a lens with a wide aperture, will help you to achieve good bokeh. Look for a lens with an aperture of at least ƒ/2.8. A larger aperture with more background blur means more bokeh. (And you will get the bonus of better control of your exposure as well)

Prime, rather than zoom, lenses are also preferable.

When it comes to focal length, you will find that the longer the focal length the softer the bokeh.

How to achieve bokeh

We know that a fast, prime lens set to a wide aperture is the best place to start to achieve good bokeh. This will help to create a shallow depth-of-field in your shot. By shooting in manual or aperture priority mode, you can control your aperture.

Try to keep as much distance between your subject and the background to help with the depth-of-field, too.

Getting as close to your subject as possible will also help with the bokeh effect. As you move closer to your subject it magnifies the background blur. If you move away from your subject, you will notice that it disappears.

Your background choice is going to have an impact, too. If you have a relatively uniform background, for example a stand of trees, it’ll be smooth. If the background is filled with different elements, like people and cars, and buildings, then the background blur will have a messy feel to it.

If you don’t have a super-fast lens, it isn’t the end of the world when it comes to bokeh. You can still work toward creating those out-of-focus points of light show up in your background. Keep your aperture as wide as you can. Shoot with your subject as far from the background as possible. And make sure that you get in close to your subject.

Different bokeh shapes

There are so many different shapes! Bokeh can be round, hexagonal, donut-shaped, cat eye-shaped, swirly, even square. You can modify your lenses and create dreamy or ‘explosive‘ bokeh. Or you can make your own shapes using a lens cap or cardboard. The possibilities are endless.

Typically, High-end lenses with a wide aperture will create a round, smooth bokeh shape; Lenses with straight aperture blade will create hexagonal or pentagonal shapes; Lower end lenses, even with round aperture blades, tend to create cat-eye-bokeh at the edge of the frame, and mirror lenses will create different shapes! Bokeh can be round, hexagonal, donut-shaped bokeh. Some lenses like the Petzval, have a unique swirly bokeh shape.

A short history of bokeh

Bokeh wasn’t really a thing until the digital era. And before that, it’s interesting to look at classical painting and how it influenced early photographers.

In classical art

Classical painters usually avoided blur in both foreground and background. Artists would place their subjects either against a plain background or against a very ‘busy’ one that helped to tell a story. In the early days of photography, this was the was how people were photographed. But interestingly enough, as photography evolved, it started influencing modern painting and sort of completed the circle. I find it pretty interesting how different forms of art intertwine.

In photography

Even in the 1970s, bokeh was still not popular in photography. If you watch the video, Simon the narrator says how the the first commercial bokeh-rich he noticed was the cover of the 1972 Pink Floyd album Obscured by Clouds. Back in the day, he says that he would have called it an ‘abstract photo’, and he was completely fascinated by it.

The term bokeh was first introduced to the photographic world in 1997 in Photo Technique Magazine. And only in the digital era, photographers started paying more attention to it. It was only in the 21st century that we started debating on how we can use bokeh to add quality to our images – and there sure are plenty of ways. This is when bokeh became more than just background blur – it became an art form. In fact, it became so important and appreciated, that even phone manufacturers compete who would make it look better in their cameras.

FAQs

[Bokeh: How it’s evolving – and how digital photography is elevating bokeh to an art form. via FStoppers]