Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah. I don’t see anything here that couldn’t be done in Photoshop with a bit of masking work. Here’s an example [1] of how bokeh really looks, using a high quality fast lens on a decent camera. We’ve got a long way to go. [1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Josefina...
So it’s a “find bright spots, bloom them into circles or hexagons or some such, then make 2-4 offset less opaque circle clones and overlay them offset by position”?
There’s a bit more to it than that. Look near the edges of the frame vs the middle. Also note that the effect is not binary. It’s dependent on depth as well as angle. One of the reasons the example from the original article looks so unrealistic is that the flowers are not at a great depth so they really shouldn’t be blurry unless the subject is also out of focus.
Additionally: finding true bright spots (vs regular objects that happen to be white) is difficult with a typical low dynamic range photograph. You’d have a much easier time with an HDR photo. It still wouldn’t give you any depth or angle information though.