What ever happened to soft focus?

I just spotted a EF135 Soft Focus on a second hand gear sales site, this got me wondering, what happened to them? Did they just go out of fashion or did digital kill them?

There is a new 85mm one for the new RF mount.
Not sure why.

Oh it's still a thing

Moppie wrote in post #19099973
There is a new 85mm one for the new RF mount.
Not sure why.

It's not soft focus, rather smooth transition or similar.
Like Sony 100 STF, or Laowa 105 f2 STF.

In the case of the Sony it is an f2.8 lens with, due to the apodisation element, T5.6. This is comparable to the Canon RF lens.
The Laowa has 2 sets of aperture blades and 2 aperture rings on the lens barrel (it also has apodisation element.)

FlyingPete wrote in post #19099951
I just spotted a EF135 Soft Focus on a second hand gear sales site, this got me wondering, what happened to them? Did they just go out of fashion or did digital kill them?

They never really were very fashionable, only used by few, and digital with PP options just killed it.

Kind regards, Wim

Sorry, the Soft Focus effect is intentionally caused by an apodisation element.

No.

The Canon 135 softens the in focus area and the out of focus area.
These new lenses soften the out of focus area. The in focus area is sharp.

So it's an entirely different purpose and result.

The Sony 100 2.8 is extremely sharp. A portrait taken with it at f2.8 will at first appear like a f1.4 shot from Sigma 105 f1.4.
The difference though will be it will not have the razer thin DOF, with more than just 1 eyeball in focus.

Use the Canon 135 soft focus and it looks like a 135 f2.8 shot with blur applied to the whole frame.

Canon's nomenclature is DS: Defocus Smoothing.

https://www.canon.com.​au …nses/rf-85mm-f1-2l-usm-ds

The RF 85mm f/1.2L USM DS enables you to achieve signficantly smoother bokeh. Canon's original DS (Defocus Smoothing) coating gradually decreases the transmittance of light from the center to the periphery of the lens, which enables you to achieve significant softness and smoothness of outlines.

Scroll down to see an example of the difference between RF 85 1.2 and RF 85 1.2 DS and note it is nothing like the 135 2.8 Soft Focus.

Fuji was the first with these, not soft focus, rather, soft out of focus lenses with their 56 1.2 APD.

Look ma, 2 Aperture rings!

That is interesting, although it seems that they are trying to get their lenses to produce bokeh like Portrait Mode on iPhone (or equivalent on other devices) with blurred backgrounds. I suppose the question there is - are out of focus and blurred the same thing?

Judge for yourself.

As I posted above:
Scroll down to see an example of the difference between RF 85 1.2 and RF 85 1.2 DS.

There are plenty of reviews for the 4 lenses I mentioned showing what they do.

So the whole point is to smooth over the out of focus background area?
i.e soft focus.

Just 30 years of technology difference means the later lens with an apodisation element, dual apertures etc, are able to retain some level of image sharpness towards the center of the frame.

These modern lenses may be better than the old soft focus lenses, but the intent and the effect is the same.

The Canon 135 soft focus softens everything. You either use it as a 'normal lens' or select 'soft focus' and everything is softened.

Don't you think a lens that does not soften the subject but does soften the out of focus area is a different effect and intent?