What to do about ugly background?

[unpopular]

You really went out on a limb with that comment. Often times it is a better judgement call to just shut the hell up.

Excuse me? Exactly what do you mean. As a strict generalization, zooms are not exactly known for their outstanding bokeh quality. Obviously some break this generalization, as this one does, at least at this focal length. That is all I meant by that comment.

I wasn't being sarcastic at all. My suspicion was that this image was too "clean" and with too few imperfections, so yeah, I was genuinely impressed. Maybe you misread?

 

[Buckster]

You really went out on a limb with that comment. Often times it is a better judgement call to just shut the hell up.

Excuse me? Exactly what do you mean. As a strict generalization, zooms are not exactly known for their outstanding bokeh quality. Obviously some break this generalization, as this one does, at least at this focal length. That is all I meant by that comment.

I wasn't being sarcastic at all. My suspicion was that this image was too "clean" and with too few imperfections, so yeah, I was genuinely impressed. Maybe you misread?

In my experience, most lenses exhibit pretty good bokeh when shot wide open, regardless of the focal length, because when the aperture is wide open, the blades are fully retracted, producing the round iris that is the key ingredient to "good" bokeh. That's true even for zooms.

As an example, here's a shot I recently made with one of the cheapest zooms out there that's "not exactly known for their outstanding bokeh quality", the infamous "kit" lens, the Canon 18-55 EF-S f3.5-5.6 IS II, shot at 37mm @ f/5 on a Canon 7D:

That's a pretty "buttery" bokeh in the background. Look in particular at the specular highlights of the stove knobs just to the left of the word "POP", and on the left burner and on the front right of the stove near the very bottom middle of the shot. Note how round they are - not jittery as you might expect with the 6 sides that the blades in that lens can produce "bad" bokeh with. That's because at 37mm on that cheap kit lens, f/5 is wide open, making the iris round. Look close and you'll see that nice round bokeh throughout the background - it's just easier to spot on the more pronounced specular highlights.

You might want to back off on your generalizations.