What do you do when you have fungus?

wuzzittoya wrote in post #13921912
I can see the white spots on the edges, but I thought fungus was this feathery-patterned type thing that covered your lenses...? I thought that I saw a chip too, but since it wasn't part of the discussion - is the chip looking thing where the fungus is?

I don't think it's a chip though, it's inside the glass and not on the surface, so I looked around and looked a lot like fungus to me since it is also white.

macroshooter1970 wrote in post #13921924
Hard to tell from the picture, not saying yes or no. I never seen lens fungus look like that so far? It's always fury looking lol. How's it look if you shine a flashlight through it.

WayneCornish wrote in post #13921932
Hard to tell from that picture what it is, could be a fibre of some kind or could be fungus.

I trade, repair and service classic lenses as a hobby and see a lot of fungus. I also service and repair some of the newer lenses and fungus does come in all shapes and sizes, but so do lose fibre particles.

If you can take a shot with light shining through the opposite end of the lens and tilt the lens so that the object is question is againt the inner body of the lens, it will probably be easier to see what it is.

And yes it can easily be on the inner elements of your lens.

Got to say these newer fangled lenses don't have pretty fungus, here is one with fungus that looks almost crystal like and has a large amount of spores in the lens

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Heres some 'classic' pretty fungus

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It looks like the 1st picture when I shine light through..

It might be the angle that had some of us not sure - most fungus pictures I've seen have been taken to look a lot like the ones posted by WayneCornish.

In that case, sorry to hear that. Is there anyway to get a refund, I'm guessing you bought off the forum.

wuzzittoya wrote in post #13922154
It might be the angle that had some of us not sure - most fungus pictures I've seen have been taken to look a lot like the ones posted by WayneCornish.

yes trying to figure out how to take a picture to show it better..pretty limited in my space and what lenses to use because I think my 5D and 16-35L may be infected so I don't even want to touch them.

macroshooter1970 wrote in post #13922158
In that case, sorry to hear that. Is there anyway to get a refund, I'm guessing you bought off the forum.

yah Mike I bought it used from here.

Vixen89 wrote in post #13922166
yes trying to figure out how to take a picture to show it better..pretty limited in my space and what lenses to use because I think my 5D and 16-35L may be infected so I don't even want to touch them.

yah Mike I bought it used from here.

You're kidding. I was just starting to warm up to the idea of buying used gear off of here!

Now I'm back to saving up for new...

wuzzittoya wrote in post #13922185
You're kidding. I was just starting to warm up to the idea of buying used gear off of here!

Now I'm back to saving up for new...

Don't be scared about buying used, I still do and always will from POTN. Most sellers on here will honor a return or help in any way to get your satisfaction from the purchase. The seller is honoring his return so I am happy but a bit sad because I was just warming up to using the nifty fifty again since I sold my copy long ago. Just another unpleasant bump in the photography world..now the decision is to buy another or just not ...

You have to wonder how some people store their lenses. I live in a relatively humid environment but always keep my lenses in bags/cases, always keep the caps on, and never leave them anywhere that is super humid like the inside of a vehicle. That 70-300 IS is downright scary. I really can't see enough of the nifty fifty to tell for sure if that's fungus.

Fungus = bad. The good news in this case is that its not a zoom that pushes air in/out through the mount (so far as I can recall with the nifty). While it's not sealed, I doubt very much that your 5d2 has been affected. Ditto for your 16-35L. If you're really worried, you should get yourself a dry cabinet.

Something like this:
http://www.ebay.com …_Bags&hash=item​3a6fcb6fda

I keep my gear in a very similar cabinet that I bought for $150 on ebay. Gives me peace of mind, especially when I'm staying in Florida. Humidity is your enemy when it comes to fungus spores.

Vixen89 wrote in post #13922260
Don't be scared about buying used, I still do and always will from POTN. Most sellers on here will honor a return or help in any way to get your satisfaction from the purchase. The seller is honoring his return so I am happy but a bit sad because I was just warming up to using the nifty fifty again since I sold my copy long ago. Just another unpleasant bump in the photography world..now the decision is to buy another or just not ...

I've had 3-4 nightmare purchases here and on FM... and I've only been registered less than 2 years! Things do get listed incorrectly, and some sellers are less than honest. I've had to initiate chargebacks and the like. Be very careful, even here.

MOkoFOko wrote in post #13923247
Something like this:
http://www.ebay.com …_Bags&hash=item​3a6fcb6fda

I keep my gear in a very similar cabinet that I bought for $150 on ebay. Gives me peace of mind, especially when I'm staying in Florida. Humidity is your enemy when it comes to fungus spores.

Thanks for that link. I just purchased the next size up from the same seller. Where I live it's quite hot, not always humid but it can get very humid at times. With all the money I've put into lenses lately I figured it's a small price to pay to protect them. Thanks again

MOkoFOko wrote in post #13923247
Fungus = bad. The good news in this case is that its not a zoom that pushes air in/out through the mount (so far as I can recall with the nifty). While it's not sealed, I doubt very much that your 5d2 has been affected. Ditto for your 16-35L. If you're really worried, you should get yourself a dry cabinet.

Something like this:
http://www.ebay.com …_Bags&hash=item​3a6fcb6fda

I keep my gear in a very similar cabinet that I bought for $150 on ebay. Gives me peace of mind, especially when I'm staying in Florida. Humidity is your enemy when it comes to fungus spores.

I would need about six of those. I use a 54" gun safe.

So, I'm the guy who sold this lens - and needless to say I was duly mortified by the thought that I'd let something out of the house with fungus on it. I'm extra careful with storing lenses (after seeing some horrific cases of fungus up close and personal) and I'm usually very good with examining lenses before selling. I suppose I was a bit cursory with this one given its low price - shameful, really, and a regrettable show of disrespect to that venerable most Nifty of Fifties.

Still, I figured that anyone following this thread might want to see this thing more closely. Having examined it, I can pretty safely say that it's not fungus but rather some sort of glass flaw. It's not white but clear, and with the naked eye and the help of a flashlight it seems quite a bit like a rogue bubble. it definitely has a "3d" feel to it, as though it reaches a millimeter or two into the element. I'm surprised that I never noticed it before - though I suppose it could have developed over time. On closer inspection, I really have no idea what it is. It's too irregular to be a bubble, but doesn't seem "crystalline" enough to be a chip. And there's no opaque, organic-looking aspect to it at all that would indicate fungus.

Here are two shots from opposite ends of the lens:

cptrios wrote in post #14009552
...
PS - A note on fungus and its "contagion." A lens with fungus is contagious in that putting it in a bag with other lenses will likely increase their chances of getting fungus. That increase, however, will be quite small - and if there's no moisture in the lenses, it won't have a chance. It'd be like a virus trying to infect someone with no blood. In fact, several of your lenses probably have fungus spores inside them already, but they pose no threat....

+1
Fungus is much less dangerous than most think - this is at least my opinon.
Part of my tinkering hobby is to clean lenses with fungus - and that lens that got fungus during my >20 years of photography was bought new, and was the first lens with fungus I have - afterwards I buy sometimes lenses with fungus for cleaning experiments.

Regarding that image you show: Does n´t looks like fungus. But I can not identify it.

cptrios wrote in post #14009552
So, I'm the guy who sold this lens - and needless to say I was duly mortified by the thought that I'd let something out of the house with fungus on it. I'm extra careful with storing lenses (after seeing some horrific cases of fungus up close and personal) and I'm usually very good with examining lenses before selling. I suppose I was a bit cursory with this one given its low price - shameful, really, and a regrettable show of disrespect to that venerable most Nifty of Fifties.

Still, I figured that anyone following this thread might want to see this thing more closely. Having examined it, I can pretty safely say that it's not fungus but rather some sort of glass flaw. It's not white but clear, and with the naked eye and the help of a flashlight it seems quite a bit like a rogue bubble. it definitely has a "3d" feel to it, as though it reaches a millimeter or two into the element. I'm surprised that I never noticed it before - though I suppose it could have developed over time. On closer inspection, I really have no idea what it is. It's too irregular to be a bubble, but doesn't seem "crystalline" enough to be a chip. And there's no opaque, organic-looking aspect to it at all that would indicate fungus.

So...any ideas?

PS - A note on fungus and its "contagion." A lens with fungus is contagious in that putting it in a bag with other lenses will likely increase their chances of getting fungus. That increase, however, will be quite small - and if there's no moisture in the lenses, it won't have a chance. It'd be like a virus trying to infect someone with no blood. In fact, several of your lenses probably have fungus spores inside them already, but they pose no threat.

So as long as you keep your lenses totally dry, they're pretty much immune to fungus. If you were to pull the lens apart and scrape the fungus off, releasing spores into the air...well, that would probably be a bad idea. But the chance that they'll jump from one lens to another, provided the second lens is nice and dry, are minuscule. So, just make sure to keep your lenses in a dry place and give them a sun bath every once in a while! Humidity will also, for example, mess up and crack the rubber on your zoom/focus rings.

I've seen this before in cheaper glass, appears to be glass bubbles to me. Definitely a glass imperfection and not surprising considering the cost of the nifty fifty.