filters as protection

[irish626]

Good afternoon,

Just out of curiosity, do you have uv filters as protective devices on all your lenses?

[RobertTheFat]

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@irish626 wrote:

Good afternoon,

Just out of curiosity, do you have uv filters as protective devices on all your lenses? 

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No. The only filters I carry are circular polarizers.

[Waddizzle]

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@irish626 wrote:

Good afternoon,

Just out of curiosity, do you have uv filters as protective devices on all your lenses?

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Yes, and no.  I began buying a UV filter for my inexpensive lenses.  I now buy CLEAR filters for all of my expensive lenses.  Most of my expensive lenses all use the same size filter, 77mm.  I have a couple of sets of UV/CPL/ND filters that I use.

Most of what filters can do, can be simulated in software post-processing.  Be aware that the more post processing that you do, the more noise that you may introduce into the image.

[ebiggs1]

"... do you have uv filters as protective devices on all your lenses?"

I put 'Protecto' not necessarily UV filters on all the lenses that will benefit from them.  I have expensive lenses. I have a few lenses that don't have filter threads for protective filters.  Therefore they don't gey one.   If you have a lens that costs $125 bucks than it probably isn't a reasonable idea to put a high quality filter on it for protection.  A quality filter can cost $50 for instance.  It can be much more for the larger lenses. The B+W Clear MRC 007M Filter is an example.

Let me ask you this, would you rather clean the fragile front element of your lens or an easily replaceable filter?  Common sense says clean the filter doesn't it?  If you have children or you shoot kids, for some reason they love to stick their hands and fingers into the hood of a lens.  You should always use a hood, BTW.

Next point, some Canon lenses require a filter to complete its weather sealing.  And most lenses benefit from a filter if it gets rained on.

Now you will hear from the phoo-phooers that filters can cause some issues in certain situations.  But they seem to forget, filters come off as easily as they screw on.

So ther you are, is it yes or no?

[diverhank]

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@irish626 wrote:

Good afternoon,

Just out of curiosity, do you have uv filters as protective devices on all your lenses?

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This is a contentious issue.  There will always be at least 2 camps - one swears by using UV filters for protection and the other to go without.  There are no right or wrong here as far as I'm concerned.  You will hear all kinds of anecdotes on how filters saved expensive lenses...etc.

I own a lot of expensive L lenses and I had long ago removed all UV filters for protection.  While I think that UV filter might save a lens, I'm not willing to put it on permanently just for that.   I rely on the lens hoods for protection and I'm always conscious of where and what my lens, while mounted on the camera, is going to touch.

UV filters, even the really good and expensive ones will not improve the IQ of your lens.  At best, they won't hurt too much.  Most people pay less than $100 for a filter to put in front of a $2000 lens...whatever little gain you get with an expensive lens over an average is diminished by an UV filter, imho.

I do put on Circular Polarizer and ND filters on an as needed basis, but not mount them permanently.  Occasionally when I know I'll be in tough environments (sea spray, dust storms, etc), I've been known to throw an UV filter on for the occasion, otherwise I want to maximize the lens IQ by going without.

[jrhoffman75]

As stated, some lenses require a filter to complete the weather proofing. If that's important to you then a filter is required. 

The $100 filter on a $2000 lens argument sounds good, but is really specious. The $2000 lens has special glass and a lot of engineering to achieve its goal. A filter isn't trying to do what a lens does. A filter will never improve the quality of a lens, but quality filters will rarely diminish the quality of a lens. 

But, if all you want is finger-proofing and branch impacti protection a lens hood will achieve that and minimize flare as well. 

[ebiggs1]

"...  if all you want is finger-proofing and branch impacti protection a lens hood will achieve that ..."

Obviously, you have never shot kids for a living!  Not only does a hood offer little resistance to little kids, it is a irresistible place to stick little fingers.  In all my years of shooting whatever, I have yet to have a Mom say, "Wow that's a great photograph if only you hadn't used a protective filter."  Not once!

[jrhoffman75]

For a living no.

[TCampbell]

No... but I do "own" them.

The UV filter actually served a real purpose back in the days of film because the film was actually sensitive to UV light which our eyes cannot see... but which also focuses at a different distance than the visible light.  This would cause a slight blurring of the image, so you could get sharper images by filtering out the unwanted light.

It turns out the CMOS sensor inside a DSLR is also sensitive to UV (and IR) light... but the camera has a built-in filter which is located immediately in front of the sensor.  So the "UV" filtering is already handled and putting another UV filter on the front of the camera is redundant.

Since the filter is a flat piece of glass, it is reflective.  As light enters the camera, it can reflect off the first lens element, onto the flat UV filter, and back into the lens a 2nd time.  This creates "ghosting" and can also increase flaring.  In other words, the filter usually degrades the optical quality of the image.  The brighter the object, the more likely it is to occur.

Higher end filters (not just UV ... but any filter) can have anti-reflective coatings which help reduce the issues, but they don't completely eliminate the issue.

It turns out the use of a filter might be benefiticial for weather sealing for SOME lenses... and then only when you're in an environment where you expect to be exposed to things that you need to deal with... shooting near spray, dust, etc.   

The filter turns out to be lousy protection from the front of the lens actually hitting something (like the corner of a table, for example).  The filter will shatter quickly and now your smashing sharp shards of hard glass onto your object lens instead of soft wood (which would have been less likely to scratch).  In other words using the filter can be worse than having no filter at all when it comes to bangs.

A better way to protect from bangs is to always attach the lens hood... that way the hood bangs into objects instead of your glass.  

I do own polarizing filters, neutral density filters, and gradient neutral density filters... and while I do "own" UV filters, I leave those off the lens unless I'm going to be shooting in an area where I might need some protection from, say the spray of water or rain (some Canon "L" series lenses will state in their instructions that you should add a filter to the front of the lens to "complete the weather seal" -- other L series lenses do not call for a filter for weather-sealing purposes, and some other L series lenses are not weather sealed at all (with or without a filter) and zero non L-series Canon lenses have weather sealing.  If you expect to be subjected to weather issues you can always get a rain-jacket for the camera.

[ebiggs1]

Tim  Not you too?

"The filter turns out to be lousy protection from the front of the lens actually hitting something (like the corner of a table, for example)."

You can come up with a ton of scenarios where the filter happened to not help protect and I can come up with a ton of ways it did work.  What about hitting a branch?  Better to scratch a filter than a front element.  You say always use a hood but if you had the hood on the lens, "the corner of a table" would not likely break either.

I maintain it is better to clean a filter than a front element.  Again you do not photograph little children for a liivng.  Example.  People that hobby around with photography can get by with so-so practices.  If what you photograph is the starry heavens I wouldn't use a protecto (UV) filter either.

To each his own!