Quantaray filters

Good or bad? What's your take?

TIA

~Mike

Most of us consider Quantaray stuff to be overpriced junk, including their filters.

Quantaray is usually manufactured by Sigma, and there is nothing wrong with them. The lenses and filters are identical to the equivalent Sigma models, they are merely house-branded for Ritz camera.

They are not junk. One filter is as good as another. If you buy a multi-coated filter, it will reduce flare a little bit. Otherwise, there is no difference between brands of filters.

Some Quantaray, not all, lenses are made by Sigma according to Quantaray specifications. They are not simply rebranded Sigma lenses and do not come close to equalling Sigma in quality. They are low grade consumer grade, perhaps a step above junk.

Red Nates wrote in post #6768097
Quantaray is usually manufactured by Sigma, and there is nothing wrong with them. The lenses and filters are identical to the equivalent Sigma models, they are merely house-branded for Ritz camera.

They are not junk. One filter is as good as another. If you buy a multi-coated filter, it will reduce flare a little bit. Otherwise, there is no difference between brands of filters.

Sorry to break the news to you, but you're wrong. A crap filter will impact image quality. A good filter (B+W MRC, etc) will not. That's just like saying all glass is glass. Why doesn't Canon just use the glass out of your window panes to make its lenses?

Red Nates wrote in post #6768097
Quantaray is usually manufactured by Sigma, and there is nothing wrong with them. The lenses and filters are identical to the equivalent Sigma models, they are merely house-branded for Ritz camera.

They are not junk. One filter is as good as another. If you buy a multi-coated filter, it will reduce flare a little bit. Otherwise, there is no difference between brands of filters.

I rarely disagree on the forum, but in this case I feel there is a huge difference in filter quality between manufacturers. I received a cheap filter with a lens I purchased on Ebay from Canoga Camera. The thing was junk, but I didn't know it until I used it. The flare it produced was horrible. I almost sent the lens in for repair until I read a thread suggesting I go without the filter and see the results. The filter ended up in the garbage. I started doing homework on filter and soon realized the difference. I don't care who makes what, cheap filter will destroy IQ.

You are all entitled to believe what you want, and spend your money the way you want.

There are only a very few companies who make optical glass in the whole world. There are only a few companies who make filters.

Every filter made is produced by these few companies, with the same sources of optical glass.

You pay for the brand name, and slight variations in the quality of the metal mount. Most filters are sourced and rebranded by various "manufacturers".

PS: Quantaray lenses are rebranded Sigmas. Sigma does not tool up to make cheaper lenses to supply one camera chain. Sigma and Quantaray are 100% identical. If you believe this is wrong, you can disassemble the Quantaray lenses next to the Sigmas equivalent, and see for yourself.

Don't react emotionally to something that you only know through hearsay.

Red, you're right. Sigma makes the Quantaray filters, but I also would not put Sigma in the same class as Schneider and Tokina when it comes to making optical glass for filters. Quantaray filters have been known many times over to impact image quality.

To the original poster, my advice would be B+W or Hoya/Kenko multi-coated filters. If you're looking at saving a couple bucks, order them from hvstar.net.

Red Nates wrote in post #6768097
They are not junk. One filter is as good as another. If you buy a multi-coated filter, it will reduce flare a little bit. Otherwise, there is no difference between brands of filters.

Just plain wrong LOL

i purchased 52mm and 72mm Quantaray Pro Digital UV's. they have worked great for me

SkipD wrote in post #6767870
Most of us consider Quantaray stuff to be overpriced junk, including their filters.

I own a Quantaray tripod. It's very stable and has held up solid for more than a year and a half that I've owned it. It's definitely not junk. I've never tried any of their filters or lenses.

Sigma sources their optical glass from Hoya.

Hoya, Kenko and Pentax are in the same group. The brand Kenko is mostly in use in Japan, Hoya is being marketed worldwide.

Japan Hoya also supplies the optical glass to all the major lens makers like Nikon, Canon, Sigma, Tamron, Tokina, Olympus, Sony, Cosina, etc. They are the huge mega-corporation for optical glass in Asia.

Only Nikon makes some of their own glass.

In Europe the leading glass supplier is Schott AG. So makers of Leica, Carl Zeiss of Germany, B+W, Heliopan, etc., get almost all of their glass from them.

Zeiss developed lens coating just before WWII. It was a German National Socialist State war secret, used for submarine periscopes, gun sights and so forth. The first lenses to be coated were Zeiss lenses like the 50mm Sonnars on Contax rangefinders. Germany also shared some of their coating secrets with Nippon Kogaku, which became Nikon, for Japanese war optical production.

Kodak managed to do some lens coating during WWII, but their coatings were softer and inferior to the German coatings, they took the secrets after the end of the war. The USSR also took almost the entire German optical industry to places like Kragsnogorsk, and did lens coating there, as war reparations.

Before the war, Nikon made the lenses for Canon. In the 1950's, Nikon made some of the optical components for Canon, but the Japanese jointly developed higher quality hard coating for their optical groups. That's why Nikon and Canon lenses from the 1950's still have good hard coatings, but the German coatings, like on Leitz lenses, have turned to haze.

In the 1960's, the Japanese developed multi-coating. Canon called it S.S.C., Pentax called it SMC, there were many marketing names.

Zeiss developed an excellent multi-coating they called T*.

So today, almost every single filter made uses either Schott or Hoya glass. The multi-coatings are almost identical, there is just a tiny variation in the spectrums and flare resistance.

You pay big money for brand name filters with muti-coating. You pay very little money for non-brand name filters, or names like "Quantaray", without multi-coating.

You are getting EXACTLY the same glass, and just about the same coatings, no matter what brand you buy.

The power of suggestion is very strong, and brand loyalty is hard-wired into your brain. Those that feel strongly about "their" brand truly believe that "theirs" is best.

You can read THIS if you like:

http://www.rsna.org …r2006-2/name_brands-2.cfm

So if you want to be a realist, don't worry too much about your filter.

If having your preferred brand makes you happy, then, you are entitled to the pursuit of happiness. (At least you were in the USA before the Constitution became a convenient fiction)

People like to have the rewards centers of their brain light up. This alone is a good reason to buy your preferred brand, or one that has the group consensus on internet forums.

The money you spend is for a slightly different material or style of the filter ring, and the name stamped or engraved on it.

Happy Shooting!

TaDa wrote in post #6768569
Red, you're right. Sigma makes the Quantaray filters, but I also would not put Sigma in the same class as Schneider and Tokina when it comes to making optical glass for filters. Quantaray filters have been known many times over to impact image quality.

To the original poster, my advice would be B+W or Hoya/Kenko multi-coated filters. If you're looking at saving a couple bucks, order them from hvstar.net.

kindollfamilly wrote in post #6768541
I have to say that I have a hard time believing as well that Sigma is going to PURPOSEFULLY downgrade and retool a line just to make lower quality lenses for one camera shop. Just wouldn't make anywhere close to good financial sense.

Now simply changing the logo for a stretch of lenses they produce for a single camera shop sounds much more feasible to me.

Not trying to be argumenative, just thinking logically with a business frame of mind.

There is a certain logic that says a company would not go to the time and expense to retool to knock out some off-brand stuff, but then again, many manufacturers make varying levels of quality within their own lines, also.

Why is it such a disturbing thought that Quantaray and Sigma are identical? (except for the label)

The same debate rages endlessly on Leica forums.

Except for the Leica M8, all the point and shoot Leica cameras are identical to the Panasonic Lumix cameras, except for some styling cosmetics.

But the people who have paid up to twice the price for the "Leica" branded Lumix cameras continually invent imaginary "differences" to justify what they spent on their "Leica" cameras.

Even Leica and Panasonic have confirmed that the cameras are the same, they use the same firmware, yet the buyers of the more expensive branded cameras refuse to believe it. They insist that there must be some "secret" difference that makes them the members of an elite club.

photoguy6405 wrote in post #6768855
There is a certain logic that says a company would not go to the time and expense to retool to knock out some off-brand stuff, but then again, many manufacturers make varying levels of quality within their own lines, also.

Thanks everyone, I appreciate your feedback. I recently received my 70-200 and only want to go with a quality filter so I just wanted to something easy to get for the meantime before I order some online. I plan to shoot at the Zoo and always fear taking it outdoors without a filter, but I guess I'll hold back a bit on one.