What filters are bettermainly for protection?

I agree with Bill, in theory yes, filters will lose you some sharpness, but in reality it doesnt make any difference, I use the cheapest that Hoya make, they are not the Pro range, with 2 identical shots zoomed in to 100% there was no difference at all, not the slightest loss in sharpness, thats with a cheap £10 filter!!.

As for using a hood, these only protect against 2 things, accidentally hitting the front element onto your subject & lens flare caused by light hitting on the front element, they will not protect against anything else.

My main use for a filter is to keep my front element scratch free & even if it is very scratch resistant, it keeps it dust free & adds some form of sealing, my filter has fingerprints & dust on it, when I take it off to clean it the lens element hasnt got a spec of dust on it, its VERY good!!

At the end of the day, TRY IT YOURSELF!!! dont believe what you read about filters doing this & that to your images, plenty of us have found that they make no difference, under extreme glare conditions they will add a little more flare to your photo but nothing much if you use MC filters & the image would certainly be poor anyway with that much flare happening, better to use a hood & alter your angle slightly.

Nick

I too am a UV filter user, and often a comment is made that one shouldn't put cheap glass in front of an "L" lens. I agree.

Let's put things into perspective;

My lens cost $1450 Cad, my UV filter cost $90 Cad. The lens cost about 16 times the cost of the filter.

The lens has 18 elements, all of them likely at least as thick as my filter.

So, my filter is about 1/18th the thickness of the elements - chances are it's as good optically as the lens is.

How much is this expensive UV filter degrading the lens? Is it significant?

Oddly enough, some people will ignore sensor dust spots which degrade image quality more than a high class filter (one fellow claimed he hadn't cleaned his sensor in over two years!! I was astounded).

As Bill Roberts said, "the argument comes to about whether the degradation can be seen in real life terms."

Your filter Glenn works out more expensive per element than your lens [90x18] so in theory it shouldnt degrade quality at all, its only like a 19 element lens, not a case of putting cheap glass in front of good by any stretch of the imagination.

Nick

I have a Hoya Pro-1 Digital MC protection filter on the front of my L lenses. Yes they are a nightmare to clean and no, nothing infront of the lens is 100% perfect (99.7 I think is what they quote?). BUT even with the lens hoods attached (100% of time) I just don't want anything touching the front element, freak accident or not! I'm a little touchy at the moment, until I get used to having the lenses after a few years and then I'll be "throwing" them into the bag... not!

Nick_C wrote in post #2394512
Your filter Glenn works out more expensive per element than your lens [90x18] so in theory it shouldnt degrade quality at all, its only like a 19 element lens, not a case of putting cheap glass in front of good by any stretch of the imagination.

Nick

Yup, you followed my post - my filter is probably as good as my lens.

In any event, the loss of quality will NOT be noticeable, and all the time it protects my lens.

Flare? In a potential flare situation, the filter comes off for a few moments.

Having started photog 44 years ago, I've cleaned a few lenses, and a lot of filters. The flat surface of a filter is easier to clean that the curved surface of a lens; and that's one the reasons I use the UV filter. If I bug--- it up, I won't be angry with myself for a few years.

Yeah it doesnt make sense not to use them, some people condemn them without even trying a good quality one first, some say a hood is all you need which I cant believe, & ive even seen some posts where they have scratched their front element & that it doesnt matter as it hasnt effected quality, very very weird!! one minute they are SO fussy as to not want any filters on their lenses (as if they can see any difference!!), the next minute they are happy to live with a few scratches, lol... ive used UV filters for years with no problems, ive only ever had 1 shot that I would say has been ruined with flare & that was pointing up at a tree with the sun directly behind, I knew at the time it might not turn out too well.

Anyway, lets not let this thread turn into another dreaded UV>NoUV post, we have been there before :-p

My advice to anyone is to get a decent one, you dont have to go for the "best" out there, but go for a famous make, always get a UV & not a skylight, as a UV doesnt alter the image in any way, a skylight adds a little warm colour cast.

Nick

I use the Hoya thin UV for protection. Don't have any complaints.

Tim