Talk:Bokeh

Japanese Noun forms and verb nominalizers

The article states that ぼけ is the noun form of ぼける, which is incorrect. In fact boke is not so much a noun as it is an adjective meaning blurry or unfocused. The noun form of bokeru (the verb to become blurry but mostly used to refer to people becoming senile) is either bokerukoto or bokeruno. This is the only rule in Japanese for making a verb a noun. You can't make a noun from a verb just by dropping ru from the verb, which the article seems to imply, that is not a rule of Japanese grammar. Though it does seem there are some instances of verbs being formed by taking a noun and adding ru, this is not technically how a noun is constructed. So this is a very slight issue, the statement should read, ぼけ is a Japanese adjective meaning blurred/unfocused. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.12.247.200 (talk) 04:37, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

I am Japanese and use 'boke' as a noun. Do you know the words, ピンぼけ/out of focus and 時差ぼけ/jet rag? They are nouns. Hope this page is helpful to understand the usage and meaning of 'boke' in Japanese. Oda Mari (talk) 05:28, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. To clarify, I am in agreement that boke is a noun (though I realize I stated it was an adjective), but my postulation is that boke is not the noun form of bokeru. Seeing that you cannot formulaicly drop ru from a japanese verb to make a noun. However you can use nominalizers such as koto/no to do so. Phenomenon like this seem to happen in Japanese alot, I think, because they'll take a noun and make it into a verb by adding る. But, the point of my post is that this doesn't mean that you can ever really expect to formulaicly change verbs to nouns this way. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.12.247.200 (talk) 09:29, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I see. I edited the lead. Feel free to correct it. Oda Mari (talk) 14:47, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Memories

Some may also use this term, loosely, to describe what happens to acutely painful or obtusely humiliating memories that are difficult to live with. The images, or memories (i.e. peoples, places) of these events can be pathologically "blurred" or put "out of focus", to allow them to cope or carry on with their life.

As with Bokeh, the characteristics of these memories may be quantified by the circle of confusion. In out-of-focus areas, each point of light becomes a disc. When referenced in a poetic or a metaphoric sense, the disc could be uniformly illuminated, for others it is brighter near the edge, and for others it is brighter near the center. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.48.17.253 (talk • contribs) 21 May 2004.

Two questions:

1) When you say "Some may also use this term", are you speaking generally? It's a brilliant metaphor to use in discussion, but it's such an obscure reference I wonder how many times you could say it without the other person asking: "Like a -what-?".

2) How does one pronounce 'bokeh'? My estimation: bo(long 'o')-keh (emphasis on first syllable)? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Apostata (talk • contribs) 26 June 2005.

Need Title Change to "Boke"

It should be "Boke", which is the proper Japanese transliteration, since there should not be a trailing "h" without a following vowel sound. Pronunciation of the last vowel should be "eh" similar to the vowel sound in "air". Monito 7 July 2005 12:04 (UTC)

No it doesn't need a title change. Although the transliteration is incorrect (I know some Japanese), the accepted term in English for this style of photography now is bokeh. If you're unconvinced, ask google to define "bokeh" and "boke" for you... completely different results. Enochlau 02:04, 11 July 2005 (UTC)

I added a reference to the Mike Johnston column in which he claims that, as then editor of Photo Techniques magazine, he coined the 'bokeh' spelling in an attempt to suggest the correct pronunciation to english speakers, who were inclined to pronounce 'boke' similarly to 'broke', 'spoke', or 'toke'. Matthew Brown 14:03, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

It should be boké or have some other accent on the 'e' to show that the 'e' is pronounced.Cameron Nedland 14:39, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree that bokeh is most common spelling, and the best title for the article. — brighterorange (talk) 18:51, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Quality not Quantity

The pictures at the side of the article incorrectly use the term "bokeh" to denote the QUANTITY of blur rather than the QUALITY of the blur that's present. Quantity of blur may be more correctly denoted by the quantity of "depth of field", ie. shallow or deep DOF(as illustrated by the photos). It might be useful to emphasize in this article that bokeh isn't a quantity at all; it's "good", "mediocre" or "bad", but never "lots of bokeh" or "no bokeh". Thedeepabyss 12:57, 27 October 2005 (UTC)

Mirror Lenses

Is the bokeh of a mirror lens really called doughnut bokeh? I've always heard it referred to as two-line bokeh, because it has the effect of doubling out-of-focus edges. Tom Duff 00:33, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

I've heard the "doughnut" term as well. Matthew Brown 14:05, 19 November 2005 (UTC)

Both 'donut'/'doughnut' and 'two-line' can be used to describe the bokeh of a mirror lens; it depends on the feature which is out of focus. Due to the central obstruction in such lenses, out of focus points appear as donut shapes. This is seen especially if there are bright points (such as reflections) in the background. The size and definition of the donut depends on how far out of focus the point is. The two-line effect occurs as a superposition of a line of points - it then appears as two parallel lines separated by the diameter of the donut for a point which is equally out of focus. A special two-line case occurs at an out-of-focus high contrast edge between two large areas - a bright line will appear in the dark area and a dark line will appear in the bright area, each parallel to the high contrast edge and separated from it by the radius of the corresponding donut. AliasMarlowe (talk) 19:10, 14 August 2008 (UTC)

Images

Morven/Matthew Brown's edit comment suggests a new set of images to illustrate bokeh. I propose three types: An example of a wide-open lens bokeh, circular blobs. Ericd's image that was in the article previously would be a decent but not perfect example. An example of polygonal blobs caused by non-circular aperture blades. And finally an example of a mirror lens bokeh. This could be the above mentioned donut type, and probably the double-edged line preferably in the same example image. I'd like to contribute but I only have a film camera loaded with slide film at the moment (and for some time), with no slide scanner. I also don't have a mirror lens. Ziggur 22:10, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

I'll have a look and see what kind of bokeh I can get from the cheap 50mm lenses on my two SLRs. Only five blades on a Canon FD 50mm f/1.8, so I might be able to show some effects. —Matthew Brown (T:C) 01:07, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

I know that they're my images, but I though that the two jonquil flowers made a nice comaprison. --Fir0002 21:20, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Japanese term

Andy Jones left this comment in the article. I'm moving it here and have left a message on his talk page. Imroy 11:55, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

“ I think the actual term used in Japan is boke aji (ぼけ味）in which boke means blur and aji means taste or flavor, hence the compound meaning used in the word bokeh in English - the flavor, or quality, of the blurry parts of an image Andy Jones 03:56, 25 February 2006 (UTC) ”

"boke" doesn't mean blur

The actual meaning of "boke" in Japanese is closer to "senile fool". The correct photographic term is "pinboke" ピンぼけ[1]. I confirmed this with a professional translator. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.47.58.161 (talk • contribs)

"pinboke" is one relevant term that's used in photography, according to a professional translator I talked to. However, it looks like the previous comment about "bokeaji" ぼけ味 is also correct, and more common[2][3] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.170.4.146 (talk • contribs)

Boke ぼけ is the noun form　of the verb bokeru ぼける meaning to blur. Pinboke ピンぼけ means out of focus which is similar but different to blur. Brettr 07:07, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

No, the previous unsigned comment was correct. ぼけ is (in Japanese) rather vague, and doesn't mean specifically to blur. It is most commonly associated with terms unrelated to blur. The correct term in Japanese is ボケ味 (I believe bokeaji is "officially" correct, though it is also read bokemi by some), and the term obviously simply got shortened when accepted into English. Anyway, it doesn't matter now. 210.254.117.186 (talk) 07:56, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

I rather doubt Bokeh is short of ぼけ味 instead of from ぼけ. Any source? I can understand (though arguable) that the word Bokeh may corresponds to the word ぼけ味, but I doubt Bokeh is "from" ぼけ味.

I think the current lead line, derived from Japanese bokeaji ボケ味, "blur", is wrong, since the word ぼけ味 means "flavor of blur", not "blur". --Fukumoto (talk) 15:59, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

commonly repeated misconceptions

This page (as of 15jun2006) contains several common misconceptions and factual errors.

The "hard" or "soft" quality of bokeh is primarily affected by spherical aberration. It has absolutely nothing to do with chromatic aberration, and very little to do with the number of aperture blades (except when hard-edged bokeh makes the shape of the aperture apparent.)

This is pretty much correct. In particular, a mathematically perfect lens would have a OOF blur kernel which is a fairly hard edged image of the aperture. Spherical aberration causes the focus positions of the rays to have an angular dependence. In a lens with spherical aberration light from one side of the focal plane with spread outward from the image of the aperture while on the other side the light will spread inward. The outward spreading is generally considered attractive while the inwards spreading is generally considered ugly. The 'good blur' being in front or behind the focus location depends on on the sign of the spherical aberration. The best way to illustrate this would be to obtain bellows or a tilt lens which is not perfectly corrected for spherical aberration and take a picture which is extremely tilted, thus one side of the frame will show focal positive blurring and the other side will show focal negative blurring. --Gmaxwell 18:26, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Disagree

I take issue with this sentence:

Although difficult to quantify, and hence open to debate, some lenses are believed to enhance overall image quality by producing more subjectively pleasing out-of-focus areas (bokeh).

Can't the "look" of the out-of-focusness be characterized by the image of a point source? (Or to be very exact, a point source at each point in space.) That is, at a given distance, can't this effect be considered convolution, and so if you know the kernel, you've quantified the effect? —Ben FrantzDale 20:11, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

• Yes, the lens can be quantified—but I think the sentence is saying that it is the subjective quality of the bokeh that is hard to quantify. — brighterorange (talk) 18:44, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Stefanie with Bokeh.jpg

It's a damned shame they deleted that picture.

That is all I have to say.

– ∅ (∅), 15:35, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

It's easy to replace. Get someone on it. :) --Gmaxwell 16:07, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

HDR

This article should mention high dynamic range imaging as what would be oversaturated pixels wind up blooming into the visible circles (or whatever other shape) in the final image. The GIMP plugin to do bokeh compensates for lack of HDR by selecting how close to 100%-saturated a pixel has to be to create a circle. —Ben FrantzDale 17:04, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Exposure

We should consider how exposre is involved in this. In as much as exposure is exponential and in as much as bokeh is a linear convolution in real-world brightness, it must be a nonlinear convolution of recorded image intensity. This might explain why I needed to mess with gamma before and after convolution while making Image:Faux-bokeh-final.png. —Ben FrantzDale 17:04, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Only if you're talking about working with images in non-linear space. Normally images are just 2.2 gamma or the SRGB non-linear space (which is mostly 2.2 gamma). The nonlinearity is mostly invertable, so you can still achieve the same effect by normal convolution. --Gmaxwell 17:24, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Bokeh or not...keh?

Are the star-shaped artifacts around the streetlams in this picture bokeh, or a different type of artifact? Digital camera, long-exposure shot. Rawling4851 22:26, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Those are some sort of lens flare. (It can't be bokeh because the lights themselves are in focus.) —Ben FrantzDale 00:08, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Right, I see the distinction. But the shape of the flasre is still determined bythe shape of the aperture, like the shape of a bokeh? Rawling4851 00:12, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Diffraction around the aperture? (Diffraction spike)155.212.242.34 (talk) 19:49, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, it's caused by diffraction - IIRC - and as far as I remember from my photography classes, it depends on the aperture size but not on the shape (i.e. number of blades). Blue.death (talk) 14:55, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Bokeh consists of a complicated combination of geometric and diffraction effects. Extreme diffraction effects can be considered an extreme case of bokeh if you like. Dicklyon (talk) 16:14, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

And the shape of the aperture does affect the resulting bokeh; a star-shaped aperture would produce a star-shaped bokeh effect. - ∅ (∅), 20:47, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

These artifacts are easily accomplished with a star filter. The effect varies depending on how many sets of parallel lines are scored into the filter, and how deep the scores are. Then again, in this particular picture, the exposure is very long, perhaps allowing normally imperceptible streaks to gather in a detectable manner. —Nahum Reduta (talk) 02:29, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I don't think such a filter has been used in Rawling's photo, IMHO. It's diffraction caused by the selected aperture and long exposure. I have shot plenty of night shots obtaining the same effect. Aperture shape does affect bokeh, but does it also affect this 'star effect'? - Blue.death (talk) 09:18, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

Rewrite

There seems to be an undergoing rewrite by Redikufuk (talk · contribs · count). I've posted a friendly notice on their talk page encouraging them to discuss it here. - ∅ (∅), 20:32, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

This article made more sense before Redikufuk replaced it with a lot of ten-dollar words. I'm reverting it wholesale. - ∅ (∅), 20:14, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

Deviation from disk

It appears that there are several causes for bokeh to not be disk shaped. First, there is the aperture shape. A mirror lens causes donut bokeh; a fuzzy-edged aperture would make a soft-edged blur spot. Second is aberration such as spherical aberration causing bright edges, and coma. Finally, I see diffraction around the aperture as a source of ring-shaped bokeh or of just bright edges. Can anyone comment on the magnitude of these effects? 155.212.242.34 (talk) 19:52, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm curious as to how various animals 'perceive' bokeh. For instance, cats and snakes have vertical irises, whereas toads and goats have horizontal ones. Cats in particular would seem to benefit from being able to detect unfocused lateral movement (such as a mouse sprinting along the ground). —Nahum Reduta (talk) 02:51, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Consensus on italicization

Can we get some agreement across the article on whether it needs to be in italics? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 19:37, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Use usual English typography rules. When you're talking about bokeh, no italics; when referring to the word bokeh, you do. Dicklyon (talk) 16:13, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

See Use-mention distinction —Nahum Reduta (talk) 02:32, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Circle size

I know I've seen somewhere a discussion of the size of the bokeh disk (the circle of confusion) as a function of camera parameters. That is, given a point source some distance, $d_{1}$, from a lens focused at distance $d_{2}$ with focal length l and with a given f/#, there must be an expression for the diameter of the resulting circle of confusion on the image plane. —Ben FrantzDale (talk) 17:29, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Did you look in circle of confusion or depth of field? You'll find plenty of formulas for different cases, and how to derive them. Dicklyon (talk) 17:47, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Vote for removal of text DOF photo

I think the photo of the text with the shallow DOF ought to be removed. Technically there is no bokeh in that photograph. Someone has confused shallow DOF with bokeh, and the two are not the same. 24.1.36.170 (talk) 15:28, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

bokeaji again

I recently re-researched this issue and stick by the bokeaji source. On the Japanese version of wikipedia there is an entry under boke where it is appears that the word, as used in Japanese , simply means blur. The entry describes ボケ as meaning blur, elaborating on foreground blur, background blur, diffraction blur etc., and uses ボケ味　as meaning differences in blur between different lenses and illustrates a lens that has "bad bokeaji". ( このようなレンズはボケ味が悪いと表現される ). Also, as an example of the current use of bokeaji, the Canon camera website emphasises the video capabilities of its 7D camera (which can use large aperture lenses on a large sensor) as allowing the creation of " 美しいボケ味" or "pretty bokeaji". It does NOT use simply boke to mean blur, but bokeaji specifically to mean "quality of blur". It seems clear that when the word "boke(h)" was imported into English, it was intended to represent "quality of the out of focus areas" but the term "bokeaji" is currently used in Japan for that concept. Full disclosure : My Japanese is admittedly weak but perhaps a Japanese-English bilingual reader can check out the Japanese entry on ボケ and correct any errors I may have made. Andy Jones (talk) 01:18, 28 October 2009 (UTC)Andy Jones (talk) 21:11, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Pronunciation citations

The original website that showed me the bokeaji term [4] is still up and is in agreement with the difference between the Japanese word and its English counterpart. I have a big problem with the citations for the pronunciation - the "boke-uh" ( /ˈboʊkə/ )citation is from someone who "wonders is anyone knows how to pronounce it" because he obviously does not, so I don't understand how that can support his pronunciation suggestion. "uh" is not a recognized sound in Japanese. The Merklinger citation now longer has the boke-aay ( /ˈboʊkeɪ/ ). If the latter were to be written in Japanese it would be ボウケイ　(which means, depending on which kanji are used: conspiracy, one's deceased older brother or subsidiary family line!). A lot of the fuss over this word stems from the addition of the h in an attempt to encourage the right pronunciation and not something like boak. The current entry acknowledges this by retaining the h, so please let's provide a pronunciation that gets close to the original Japanese ( something like bo- from bottle and ke- from kettle, both short vowels.) 75.106.255.38 (talk) 02:50, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Does it really matter how it's pronounced in Japanese? Shouldn't we just report what's in English sources, about how it's pronounced in English? Dicklyon (talk) 04:03, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Ah, the prescriptivist and descriptivist dichotomy! There is a significant constituency that would like to respect the pronunciation in the language from which a word is borrowed (and so to them it DOES matter), while there are some for whom that issue is irrelevant. The inclusion of the original pronunciation would inform those who already know they care about such issues and educate those with an interest in researching a word new to them. Specifically excluding the source pronunciation would be a failing even of a responsible descriptivist approach. Those who have not had any help when they meet the word (will) have come up with their own guesses. As long as it also provides the source pronunciation I have no problem with the article listing those. It would take some sort of survey to determine the (most) common ones, let alone which might rank as the "correct" English one. I have heard (several or more times each) all of the ones in the list I include here. I propose the following change to the article  : Original text : It can be pronounced /ˈboʊkeɪ/ or /ˈboʊkə/ (boke-aay or boke-uh). Proposed replacement : The Japanese pronunciation is bockeh (/bɒkɛ/). English pronunciations include : bockeh (/bɒkɛ/), bockay (/'bɒkeɪ/), boakay (/'boʊkeɪ/), bocky (/'bɒki/), boakeh (/'boʊkɛ/), boak (/boʊk/), boak-uh (/ˈboʊkə/).Andy Jones (talk) 17:46, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I am in favor of including any of that info, as long as it's sourced; for such a word, stating the pronounciation without a source to back it up is a bad idea. Dicklyon (talk) 18:54, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I can't (obviously) provide "sources" for what I've heard, so I can't help there. It's not clear how useful citing someone's "guess" on how other people should pronounce it in English (if they say it differently from the Japanese version) would be for any readers. If it's "cited on wikipedia" people tend to ascribe it some weight, but such guesses would not rise to that level, so such a source would do more harm than good, I feel! As I mentioned, the Merklinger link no longer has a recommended pronunciation and the other cite is just someone saying "I wonder if anyone knows how to actually pronounce it correctly. Personally, I go with boke-uh, as that's the pronunciation I've heard the most.". Is that really a useful, authoritative source?

It would be complicated to provide a "source" for the Japanese pronunciation. I haven't been able to find a sound file of the two syllables together. However, there is a teaching site the provides .wav files for each of the syllables, listed here [5]. Just click on them. For simplicity, I've listed links to the two sounds : the bo can be found here [6] and the ke sound is here [7]. Listening to those would be better than any IPA or Roman character description.

Providing the correct Japanese pronunciation and saying "There is no other widely-accepted "correct" pronunciation in English" would actually be the most honest way of dealing with an admittedly complex article section.Andy Jones (talk) 20:03, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, that's the thing, isn't it? Nobody cares who you have heard, but, due to WP:RS, we do care what a book author has heard. How fair is that? Seems to me it's the only guidance we've got. Dicklyon (talk) 00:25, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I knew no-one would care what I've heard, so I'll have to hurry up and finish my book, eh? I understand the logic behind the WP:RS and wonder why the Mike Johnston article (already cited, presumably as an RS, as footnote 2) is not considered a sufficient source for the boakeh (/'boʊkɛ/) pronunciation or indeed the bokeaji comment in the second paragraph of that article he published. He wrote : "it is properly pronounced with bo as in bone and ke as in Kenneth, with equal stress on either syllable" and "including the out-of-focus areas of photographs, which, I'm told, might more specifically be referred to as "boke-aji." I would expect that he should be given equal, if not greater weight, with the earlier, and better-informed input than the book guy. Perhaps you could put his description of the "correct" pronunciation in the article after the [2] footnote (under Origin in the article) to yield He altered the spelling to suggest the correct pronunciation to English speakers - bo as in bone and ke as in Kenneth, with equal stress on either syllable. Do you feel an official source is needed to support how the true source word ボケ　is pronounced in its original language, beyond the sound links I put in above (which actually match Mike J's description quite well)? Or you feel it should still be omitted? Andy Jones (talk) 01:27, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

That looks like a great source for it. So why didn't someone cite it for that? Easy to fix... Dicklyon (talk) 04:36, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, this cannot be used as a citation. But listen to the pronunciation by Japanese here. The first ボケ appears at 0:03 and the word is repeatedly used in the recording. Oda Mari (talk) 05:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for updating the article - I had, apparently mistakenly, thought that would have been noted previously as a source. Is it a matter of housekeeping to remove references when they no longer contain the information/text/item they are being cited for? I rechecked the Merklinger article (ref/footnote 6), used to support the boke-aay pronunciation, and find there is actually no mention of that. The link is therefore no longer helpful as a pronunciation guide/source.Andy Jones (talk) 16:11, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

It sucks when that happens; thanks for finding it. I usually try to go back through the history and figure out when the ref got attached to the wrong thing, and put it back where it goes, if relevant, rather than removing it. No time right now though... Dicklyon (talk) 21:51, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

It's a great article that is cited (it strongly supports the first sentence in the 3rd paragraph of Description) - it's just that it no longer comments on the pronunciation, so the ref could just be moved...Andy Jones (talk) 02:10, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

OK, I found what happened. Originally, long ago, Merlinger and some others were listed at the end, but there were no inline citation. Then I fixed that on 5 Aug 2007; but then on 10 Apr 2008, an anon IP boned it to its present form; he added the pronunciation "boke-aay", and it was his only contribution. I'll fix. Dicklyon (talk) 02:47, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Ostrich picture

Silky bokeh produced by a Nikon 200-400mm f/4 zoom lens.

Opinions needed: does this image do a good job of illustrating "silky bokeh"? Or is the background too featureless to be illustrative? Dicklyon (talk) 06:36, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I agree that it's too featureless to illustrate any of the issues that are considered in assessing good vs. bad bokeh. It illustrates well the extreme background blur due to subject to background distance being large. The daffodil [8] on the Japanese wiki page on boke [9] shows the same feature, but also shows some out-of-focus highlights that are distracting (and could therefore be assessed as "bad bokeh").Andy Jones (talk) 17:55, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I beg to differ. Bokeh, as we all know, means "blur". Whether it implies "blur of a kind that is pleasing to the eye" (as some may think) or just basically "blur" (thus requiring further qualification such as "nice bokeh" or "coarse bokeh", as I think), is irrelevant here : it means, at the very least, "blur". Nowhere is there any kind of requirement that the blur in question ought to contain (or not) a certain minimum number of features. As Andy Jones very well said above, the ostrich picture illustrates "extreme background blur", in other words : extreme background bokeh. I rest my case and put the ostrich picture back in. Dominique R (talk) 06:52, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

With respect, please exclude me from "we all know". If the word just means blur, why did anyone bother bringing the word into English, when blur would suffice? The earliest uses of the word boke(h) in English was by folks like Mike Johnston and Harold Merklinger (and others not cited yet) where the discussion was specifically about the appearance of the blur. One of the discussion points about the use of this word in English is exactly whether it is used to mean simply blur or quality of blur, so it is very relevant. SImply asserting that "we all know" the answer does not advance the discussion. The source I cited above ( [10] illustrating the boke-aji use in Japan) is a site that has been up since 1996 and it is run by a very knowledgeable photographer and Japanese speaker; he describes boke as "One of the rare Japanese words to be incorporated in the English language. It refers to the way the lens renders out-of-focus points of light. " Are we to simply ignore the large group of writers (some cited already) and users who adhere to this usage pattern/definition? I would say "We all know there are some people who use the word to mean quality of blur and some who use it to mean simply blur". This will likely remain an unanswered issue until someone does a worldwide survey and counts the numbers! It's reminiscent of the two meanings of resolution - the old one about how small a detail can be distinguished in the film (no matter how big a piece of film is considered), and the new one about how many details (pixels) are captured, regardless of how small they are. Both meanings are current and often the context makes it clear which meaning is intended. Otherwise, the usage must be clarified in the sentence. To dicklyon's request above, the use of the word "silky" implies a "subjective, qualitative" nature question, and the context therefore requires that it is the "quality of blur" meaning that is intended. Does the image show blur - yes. Can you tell, just by looking at the blur, whether it was created by a "good" or a "bad" lens - no, because it's so blurred. In my opinion, any lens would have yielded such an image because of the subject to background distance. That reasoning was the basis for the opinion I gave at the top of this discussion.Andy Jones (talk) 19:16, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Andy, that PhotoGuide Japan page has "ボケ味" boke-aji or "blur taste", and the Japanese wiki article is called "ボケ (写真)", blur (photo); so why does our page say (暈け), which seems to be something like "halo ke"? Dicklyon (talk) 23:42, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

It's complicated!!! If you paste the 暈 kanji into Jim Breen's online dictionary [11] (that is the basis for a large number of translation software programs and an RS if ever there was one) you get several words it appears in; one means halo (かさ　＝kasa) but the 4th one 暈ける 【ぼける】 (v1,vi) to be faded; to be hazy; to be blurred; to be out of focus is the direct answer to your question; 味　normally means taste/flavor but that can be figurative as in this kanji compound. However, as I said above in bokeaji again, the Japanese wiki article is called ボケ　because they (presumably the Japanese people, I've not tried to read any of their discussion) use the word to mean simply blur - foreground, background, diffraction etc types of blur are xxx-bokeh. They use "ボケ味" boke-aji when talking about the differences in how different lenses render the blur. That is consistent with the PhotoguideJapan table entry. The Japan wiki does not use the 暈 in the boke article (they prefer the phonetic ボケ), but rather uses it in the article on haloes [12]. Thus the wiki on boke avoids the use of that kanji - but when you search on that 暈け you find that many Japanese folks use it to mean bokeh in the sense of this article ! The situation seems no clearer in Japanese than it does in English, if that's any comfort to a wiki editor!!! Thus, if you put boyakeru into Breen's dictionary you get ぼやける (v1,vi) to become dim; to become blurred but it doesn't use the 暈 kanji ; Unfortunately, JimBreen's database does not extend to the esoteric jargon of photographers so it won't settle this. Mike Johnston's quote "including the out-of-focus areas of photographs, which, I'm told, might more specifically be referred to as "boke-aji" suggests that whoever educated him on the issue thought that boke-aji would be the better word to describe "how" the out-of-focus areas looked. Just to confuse matters further, and mentioned briefly way up top, there is a healthy discussion in Japan as to whether ボケ味 should be pronounced bokeaji or bokemi [13] with the 味 kanji having its on-yomi or kun-yomi reading (basically the Chinese or Japanese pronunciation!!!) So it seems that both in Japan and in English, there is a word that is used to mean either blur or quality of blur - if all the folks in Japan just used boke for blur and bokeaji for "quality of blur" things would be a tad simpler. It seems that wwhen it was imported into English, it was imported as boke when it should have been boke-aji or boke-mi, but the importers clearly were talking about the quality (good, bad, neutral, silky etc.) and not the simple concept of blur (for which one can have both quantity and quality). Oh dear :(Andy Jones (talk) 02:48, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Or I should maybe ask Oda Mari, who changed it to yet another variant back in the middle of 2008: 'boyakeru ぼやける, "become blurred or fuzzy"). And then he changed it again to boke ぼけ, a noun form of bokeru ぼける, "become blurred or fuzzy"). And then finally to a noun boke ぼけ, meaning "becoming blurred or fuzzy"). Dicklyon (talk) 23:50, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Any other opinions on the ostrick picture? Dicklyon (talk) 23:13, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm a Japanese female editor, but not an expert on photographic technique . As for the Japanese language, ask me. 暈け is the correct kanji for bokeh, but the kanji is not included in joyo kanji and rarely used for the photograph term. ボケ is the most common description. Even if there's a kanji, it is not always used. It depends. Interestingly, when referred to unintentional out of focus, it's ピンぼけ. Aji could be translated as zest or savor too. So I think "quality" is a good choice. As for the reading of 味, according to the linked discussion, aji seems to be the majority, but some use mi. IMHO, thinking about the on-yomi and kun-yomi, aji might be correct. It's a matter similar to that some pronounce the vegetable 'to-mae-to' and some say 'to-ma-to'. As for the ostrich picture, I don't think it's a good example. Putting aside the quality of bokeh, even from an armature point of view, it's not a good picture itself. It's so dark that difficult to see the ostrich clearly. If my English is not understandable enough, please point out. Thank you. Oda Mari (talk) 06:35, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

In Johnston's article, there is no reference whatsoever to bokeh having anything to do with the "quality" of the blur. To respond to Andy Jones, if bokeh, in and of itself, implied anything qualitative, talking about "good bokeh" or "silky bokeh" or "coarse bokeh" would be pleonastic, redundant and pointless. However, ALL sources I've read on the subject do exactly that, either systematically, or from time to time : qualify the bokeh in terms of good or bad quality. Which goes to show that it needs to be qualified in such terms. And if it does, it is precisely because, in and of itself and once again, it does not include any qualitative bias.

Furthermore, whether bokeh does or does not include such bias, has nothing to do with the ostrich picture which provides an excellent demonstration of what boekh is. Which is why I put it back in. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dominique R (talk • contribs) 06:47, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

In the earlier (1996 copyright) article by Merklinger, he says The Japanese apparently refer to the quality of the out-of-focus image as "boke". This inclusion of "quality" is commonplace; there are good/bad and harsh/soft qualities, of course, so these are the kinds of adjectives that are encompassed by the intended meaning of "quality" here, I think. Not sure what you refer to as "bias". The trouble with the ostrich image is that the description "silky smooth" is not really well supported by the "totally blurred" look; plus, the picture is dark and unattractive. Dicklyon (talk) 06:39, 3 November 2009 (UTC)

OK, so let's resolve this since we are invited to do so --and please avoid canvassing in an attempt to outnumber me, or I will do just the same. Number 1, we agree that "bokeh" means blur. Number 2, you maintain that "the inclusion of 'quality' is commonplace", I maintain (a) that it is not, (b) that even if it were, there is no etymological reason for it to be, and (c) that the fact that an error would be commonplace isn't a reason not to correct it (especially in Wikipedia). Number 3, regardless of what we maintain on 2 above, we agree that bokeh can appear in all areas of a photograph, highlights and lowlights alike. Base on the preceding assumptions, the ostrich picture fits very well the description of "blur appearing in darker areas of a photo", and the words "silky smooth", which also do fit perfectly with your own theory of "quality being included", are very objectively descriptive of a surface that is visually smooth, almost uniform but not quite, with differentiating patterns subtle enough to be detected by the human eye, yet without enough features to be precisely identified. As to your other "arguments", regarding the fact that, acccording to you, the ostrich picture would be "dark", well, that is precisely the point: to evidence that bokeh can appear in lowlight areas, and/or low key pictures. And finally, regarding the fact that, according to you, the ostrich picture would be "unattractive", that's a criterion I will let Wikipedia administrators judge regarding your objectivity as an editor... I find it very attractive (but that is not the point), whereas I find the picture just above it quite ugly (but that isn't the point either)... Nevertheless it would never come to mind to delete it, because that ugly (to my taste) picture is illustrative —and **that** is the point of the ostrich picture as well, as explained above. What I find painful in all this is that it has been already explained over and over above on this page, but hey... They want resolution, they get an attempt at it. Based on these detailed explanations, I put the ostrich picture back in, and await your own detailed and objective explanations, formulated in a constructive manner in order to reach resolution.Dominique R (talk) 07:21, 5 November 2009 (UTC)