
Best lenses for sunstars - luu
https://phillipreeve.net/blog/best-lenses-for-sunstars/
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CarVac
Ten blades is better than 5 blades because the spikes are half the width on
defocused points.

Newer Canon lenses have been 9- and 10-bladed.

Hasselblad's old V system lenses had 5 blades, curved in C lenses and straight
in CF and later.

Fun fact for manga fans: the heavy use of Hasselblads in fashion and the
resulting pentagonal bokeh lives on today in the frequent appearance of
pentagons in the screentones of shoujo manga.

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GlennS
I get these sunstars (I hadn't heard that name before) in my normal vision at
night. I see them on all the street lights and car headlights.

Is that normal or does it indicate some sort of problem?

If I were to ask an optician about it, what words should I use to explain the
problem? Would they know what a "sunstar" is? Is it different to "lens flare"?

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wahern
You might have astigmatism. A simple examination will tell you. When I put on
my first pair of prescription glasses in my early 20s, I was astonished at how
different everything looked, and how so many weird optical effects like
starbursts/sunstars slowly crept up on me such that I didn't realize my vision
had changed so drastically. (The period between my last eye examine in
adolescence and when I sought help for night driving was also the period I
discovered computers and Linux and long nights hacking.)

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GlennS
Ah, thank you. I do have astigmatism and my glasses do correct for it. That
explains it then.

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wahern
I've had a few lens corrections over the years, but starbursts seem to only
get worse with time since that first prescription where they completely
disappeared.

Whenever I bring up the question of corrective surgery my ophthalmologist
manages to somehow change the subject. I suspect that my astigmatism has
gotten so bad that lenses can't completely correct it (thus worsening
starbursts), making me a poor candidate for surgery in his opinion,
notwithstanding all the marketing promises out there. Perhaps we're both in
the same boat if you're also still seeing starbursts with your prescription.

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rangibaby
Straight blades+even number of blades get the best sun stars.

Rounded blades can still get a cool effect but the sunstar points look like a
triangle instead of a straight line.

