What is Schmuckle? Schmuckle is the quality of the out-of-focus area behind the main subject. (It could be the out-of-focus area in front of the main subject, but this is not often used). The word Schmuckle, when used to describe out-of-focus qualities of an image, is attributed to a fellow by the name of Mark Morgan, a "member" of the rec.photo.equipment.35mm newsgroup. Somehow, while arguing about the meaning of the Japanese word "Bokeh" (Boké), which came into use in recent years, Mark suggested a non-Japanese word, and Schmuckle it is. Understanding Schmuckle comes easilly to most people, but some people are highly determined to not acknowledge its qualities in an image. For example, you take a portrait of a lovely lady outside. Behind said lovely lady, at a good distance, are some bushes with sunlight bouncing off of the leaves. This light creates highlights in the image. Now, much of the time one will shoot portraits with a fairly shallow depth of field to isolate the subject. (Why one would leave a lovely lady isolated is beyond me, but I digress). The background highlights now beome defocused because they are too far behind the shallow depth of field. This is where the qualities of the background highlights come in. Take a Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 lens for this, and the out-of-focus background highlights will appear a bit harsh. Take a Minolta 85mm f/1.4 for the same job, and the background highlights will have a smoother, creamier rendition. There is no quantifying this, it just is. (By the way, the Minolta 50mm f/1.7 is no better than the Nikkor in this regard, and Nikon's "portrait" lenses are, of course, very good lenses. But the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 has bad enough Schmuckle that when looking at shots from this lens, you know which lens it was.) |