Late night, larking about

Okay, I admit it, there wasn't much on telly last night

I think I have a good name for this series: Bokeh triathlon
Is that bokeh explosion in the background your Christmas tree? The last one makes me think it is.

Interesting series. I would like it even better when the top of the plane the objects stand on would be without pattern. This is a bit distracting (and for me in a negative way whereas the light spots and circles from the background are distracting in a positive way).

Prieni

Bokeh Triathlon, I like it This started out as an experiment for Stefan's bokeh thread, but I got a bit carried away

Yes the greenish-blue lights are my christmas tree. The yellow ones are some fairy lights around a window. The black plane is a granite chopping board, and the solids are fridge magnets.

I see what you're saying about the white flecks in the granite. I wonder if the wife will notice if I paint it black

That's like asking will you feel any pain when she smacks you over the head with it when she finds out it was you

Interesting photos Tim.
The first two photos are very nice and how the shapes of the objects are formed in the OOF area.
The last one has a doughnut shaped bokeh that makes it very busy, which lenses did you used?

Oops, forgot to say in the original post

All three of these were with my Super Takumar 50/1.4 @ f1.4

In the 3rd one the granite platform was a bit closer to the tree than in the other two (about 1.5m, instead of 2m)

Tim you should retry it with the Takumar 85/1.8, that one has a better bokeh from what I've seen.

I'll try and remember to give it a try this weekend, but with my not-huge living room I'm not sure if I can get far enough away to use that lens.

Not only is it 85mm vs 50mm, but the close focus distance of the 50mm Tak was a lot further away than some other 50s (e.g. it is about double the distance of my Tamron 17-50). Not sure how far away the 85 will have to be to focus on the solids.

Yes and so?

Those lenses are less corrected most of the time so giving a more pleasant bokeh then the corrected lenses we have today.
The reason is that sharpness is now more important then it was then.

Yes, they were Pentax lenses from the 60s and 70s (?) back when they were called Asahi Pentax. M42 screw mounts, all manual focus. Many of them are of outstanding optical quality, easily as good as modern lenses.

Do note however that in the 80s Pentax revived the Takumar name, but put it on some lousy K-mount lenses, e.g. the 135mm f2.5 "Takumar bayonet". Don't buy that one

They also used it for a 28mm f2.8 which is identical to the later version of the Pentax-M 28mm f2.8 apart from the coatings and lettering. That one isn't a bad lens, if you can find it cheaply in good condition then it's worth a look.

Nobody seems to have a good word to say for the rest of the Takumar Bayonets though!