Thanks BB & Brian,
BB - Yeah that photo is one of my favourites, the sky was an almost completely uniform blue, a great backdrop for those faces. I was quite pleased to see a sunstar in the sunglasses too, I'm very new to this M rangfinder business, so feel like i'm fighting the equipment at the moment; albiet a rather enjoyable struggle, and have had as many abject failures as happy accidents. But i'm giving it a few weeks to decide, and at the moment I'm certain it will all feel second nature failry soon.
Brian - your interest in Sonnars is infectious! Yes I have thought about getting my lens optimised 1.5, but since I highly value the two distinct behaviours equally; I am going to leave it optimised at 2.8 and try to "learn to lean", leaning forward further with closer focus distances. The fist picture in my set was at the minimum focus distance (0.9m), and I ought to have "leaned in" by about another 5cm. And yes, the bokeh in that shot is as smooth as I have ever seen bokeh (granted, the background is not even remotely difficult
).
I'm pretty sure this is wide open (bright centre bokeh, exif deduction) taken at a range of about three meters, the front focus is still evident, but only if you really look for it. The colours are just lovely.
Here's another in B&W prob. at f2.8ish. (Neville Staple from The Specials was on, for any Ska lovers out there, it was awesome.)