oO/h

"Bokeh" simply means blur, specifically out-of-focus blur.

The only reason we added the "h" to the end of the Japanese word was that English speakers persistently mispronounced it as "boke."

It's properly pronounced in two syllables, "bo" as in "bone" and "ke" as in "Kenneth", with equal stress on each syllable. "Bokeh" written with an H simply renders that a little more accurately. At least adding the "h" stopped all the "toke" and “smoke” jokes.

The other nice unintended consequence of the spelling was that it made the term easily searchable on the internet. The added letter H acted as a sort of "tag" on the word, like a naturalist's band on the leg of a bird. Early on, a web search for "bokeh" resulted in 35 hits; by the end of the shelf-life of the May June 1997 issue of Photo Techniques Magazine, the hits were up to well over 1,200. A Google search just now yielded 11,700,000 results.

I have to say I have some reservations now about having created the monster.


oO, Kunsthaus Baselland, text excerpts