technique · 1 recipe
Bokeh
Bokeh describes the character of defocused detail, including highlight shape and transition edges, rather than merely shallow focus.
Selected recipe
Bokeh
This is the default recipe for the Bokeh Character family.
Free short AI video prompt
A starter line you can copy. The full timed recipe, still-image and production prompts are on the shot card.
Prompt rule: Keep the subject sharp and identifiable light sources at defocused depths; highlight shape and edge behavior must remain tied to the selected optical rendering and source positions.
Bokeh: Bokeh describes the character of defocused detail, including highlight shape and transition edges, rather than merely shallow focus. Keep the subject readable; motivate camera and light.
Technique guide
- When to use
- Use the out-of-focus shape of the camp copper lamp to highlight the portrait, while keeping it clearly recognizable as a lamp in the background.
- How it works
- First, place the light far enough behind the subject and remember its position in the frame. Select limited optical features such as roundness and cat's-eye edges, without forcing the entire image's bokeh to be uniform. Make only small movements with the subject at the same depth, and focus-locked observe whether the light spots are consistent with the actual light position.
- Common mistakes
- A glowing circle floating in midair. The background looks like a uniformly blurred texture, with cutout edges visible around the hair strands.
How to read this page
Bokeh is one technique in Focus & Depth. The definition states the single mechanism the frame has to show. The technique guide covers when to use it, the steps, the usual mistakes, how it differs from the neighbors, and what a successful take looks like.
The clip above is one reading, made with a third-party video model. Another model, or the same model on another day, can land on a different frame. It is an example, not a promise that a prompt will match it.
The free short prompt is a starter sentence. The shot card is the timed recipe: scene, start and end frames, action, light, and color. Three sample cards are free on the site. The rest are part of GrokCine Pro. A second name for the same shot keeps its own URL and points back at this definition.
When you write a prompt, keep the one mechanism in the definition, then name the subject, the motion, and why the light is there. Do not stack a neighboring technique into the same sentence. If the name or the example is wrong, send this page's URL from the contact page.
Prompt versions
Same technique, different prompts. Version A is the latest prompt; older versions are the exact prompts that kept clips were made from. Each version shows every model that used it.
Version A · latest：Courier · covered market after closing
Version A · Scene of this version (English, verbatim)
A rust-jacket parcel courier passes through a quiet covered market after closing. Hanging baskets, graphite shutters and spaced amber lamps define a traversable aisle without uncontrolled bystanders.
The full prompt of every version comes with the member recipe.
sha256 892c2938a5aa
Recipe
8 seconds · single take
Strasbourg, the Christmas market arcade after closing in 1965: a parcel courier in a rust-red jacket pauses beneath the stone arcade to check the label on a small parcel, three small lamps glowing far down the arcade behind.
Shot cards
The full recipe for Bokeh is a shot card
The full recipe for Bokeh is a shot card. The start and end frames, timed action, lighting and color specs, a camera parameter table, copy-ready still-image and video prompts and negatives are open to GrokCine Pro members on the web.
Related families
- Deep Focus (Deep Depth of Field)
Deep Focus (Deep Depth of Field)Deep focus keeps a substantial continuous range of distances legibly sharp within one shot. - Shallow Focus (Shallow Depth of Field)
Shallow Focus (Shallow Depth of Field)Shallow focus restricts the sharp depth range around a chosen subject while nearer and farther distances become soft. - Rack Focus (Focus Pull)
Rack Focus (Focus Pull)A rack focus deliberately transfers sharpness between two distances during a continuous shot while the composition remains stable. - Split Diopter
Split DiopterA split-field close-up attachment focuses one image region nearer while the uncovered region retains a farther focus distance.
More in Focus & Depth
References
Sources we studied for this technique. External links; we don't embed them.
Articles & definitions
- Wikipedia: Bokeh
Wikipedia · Web
Aesthetic quality of out-of-focus areas, especially point highlights.
Videos
- Anamorphic oval bokeh in a car scene
@nigripilosum · 2023-12-17 · X
Best practical use of (background) bokeh in a car scene.
Images & stills
- Josee, the Tiger and the Fish: anamorphic lens simulation
@liborek3 · 2022-07-19 · X
Josee, the Tiger and the Fish: oval bokeh, focus falloff, lateral CA.
- Helios 44-2 swirly bokeh and character lenses
@gleb_alexandrov · 2024-11-27 · X
Swirly bokeh of the Helios 44-2.
- Blender anamorphic test: oval bokeh and flares
@ItalimpexFX · 2022-01-27 · X
Oval bokeh and other anamorphic traits in a Blender test.
- Rebel Moon lenses: textured bokeh
@AdventofMelech · 2025-04-16 · X
Textured bokeh of the Rebel Moon lenses.