When it comes to Shaped Bokeh, it is all about the shape of the hole where the light goes through. Heart shaped hole creates heart shaped bokeh, stars shaped hole creates stars shaped bokeh and so on….
If you want your bokeh to be a little more elaborate you have to be pretty darn good with an exacto knife. So crude shapes are fine, but what if you wanted to do something more delicate, like writing a word. I mean, even Dr. Shepherd can only get that precise with an exacto knife. (lady readers in the audience?).
Videographers Jimmy Wong and Laurasaurus Rex (Lore), came up with a prety clever way to create delicate bokeh shapes. They used Transparencies (and kinda replicated my bokeh masters kit in the process – all for a good cause).
Jimmy and Lore made a Photoshop template of the needed “holes” and printed them at the local Kinkos. Was it nice looking, not that much. Did it do the job? judge the clip for yourself: (hint. IT ROCKS!).
read the full tutorial over at Lore’s blog.
Freaking… Brilliant. I saw the clip about the cinematographers doing this with glass plates and vinyl stickers (I think?), but I never thought about just using printed transparencies instead… So much simpler, I love it!
Awesome!