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How much do you care about your lenses? Be nice and give them a gift…

Photo by Erica Marshall

Skylights and UV filters were primarily intended to reduce the amount of UV light entering your camera. If you take a landscape photo on a sunny day with and without UV filter, you’ll probably notice that the first has a more “clear aspect” than the second, specially on distant objects (mountains, etc.). UV light can create a “blue haze” on your photos.

This was specially true for film cameras. Color film has three sensitive layers: one layer for green, one for red and one for blue. Problem is that the blue layer is somewhat also sensitive to UV light. So, the higher you are (mountain tops as an example) the more UV light will expose your film and the more bluish your photos will look. UV filters prevent this UV light from reaching your film while allowing all the other wavelengths to go through. Oh, great tool then, you might be thinking…

But there is one more important function for UV filters which is equally important whether you use film of digital, and that is PROTECTION.

Your lenses, through use, are constantly subjected to dust, scratches, humidity and so forth. Adding another layer of glass can protect your front element to a huge extent.

If you drop your lens, having a UV filter or skylight attached can mean the difference from spending another $15 on a new filter or anything from a couple hundred dollars to a couple thousand on a new lens. Is this enough to convince you?

If not I can give you my example. Some years ago, still with my film Pentax, I was just walking around the city as I sometimes like to do. My camera was hanging from my shoulder (something that I never did again) and, when climbing some stairs, to let someone pass, I stepped to the side. Result… camera hits rail, and all my blood evaporated at the sound of braking glass. I was too afraid to even look at my lens and seeing little pieces of glass on the floor didn’t help. But ok, damage had to be reviewed and I was already thinking about the price of a new lens. Fortunately the pieces of glass came from my skylight and the front element of the lens was not even slightly scratched. Having that skylight there probably saved me about $300. Even if the lens glass had not break for sure would have been scratched rendering it useless. Two lessons in it for me: carrying the camera hanging from the shoulder is dangerous and a skylight or other inexpensive glass means a huge level of protection.

Of course there are those who think that adding a $15 glass to the front of a $1000 lens can only mean a decrease in quality. My only answer is, a scratch or a broken lens definitely lowers the quality of any photo you try to make. If you are so concerned, just remove the filter before any important photo.

I have one UV filter for each lens I carry and they all live happily together.

And you? What lives at the front of your lenses?

Continuing the series “What photography is/means to you”, this time I have Remus under the spotlight.

Remus started his photoblog in 2004 and since that has been publishing some of his best work online in “Pontos de Vistas“. From his words at his site, “Pontos de Vistas” was born by merging his passion for photography and informatics. He states that at the time he knew little about photography and even today he doesn’t know much, but if you visit (which I hope you do), you’ll notice that from his “old” work up to know improvement is more than visible.

Without further delay, I’ll let Remus’ words explain more…

Remus

what photography is/means to you?

Invicta by Remus It’s very hard to answer this question and it is my belief that there is no one who can answer it 100%. Photography, as any other art form, is subjective e depends on the eyes and tastes of each of us. Any attempt to describe what photography is to us will always be incomplete, but I’ll try anyway. In a totally imperfect world, photography is the way with which I try to see and transmit the perfection of imperfection itself. It is my way of escaping and I use it to forget my bad moments, even if only for some brief minutes. It is a sort of therapy and and a way to relax physically and psychologically. If some attain tranquility and relaxation in spas, walking, yoga or similar, I do in photography. Although I’m completely amateur and without ambition of becoming a photography professional, I truly believe that photography should be intensely lived in a wise way. What was before only accessible to a small elite, with the digital photography era, anyone can access photographic art, giving birth to new talents for whom the Internet is their world gallery. I partially include myself in that group, and partially because if I’m talented or not, only time will tell. I think that to make good photography, what is mainly needed is sensibility and be critical in a way that the shutter is opened at the right moment. The rest is inevitably and totally secondary.

Want to comment or ask something to Remus? Go ahead and use the comments form bellow. I’ll make sure he’ll get any questions addressed. Willing to participate? Check the original post.

Are you a Flickr power user? (Should you be or not?)

Until now, unlike Aperture users, Adobe Lightroom users could not upload directly to Flickr. Probably frustrating if you use both regularly.

Although I use Lightroom, Flickr is not one of my first choices of social photography sharing networks, so I never felt much the need for interaction between both.

For those of you who feel this pain on a daily basis, Xof at Digitalfreak.net reports a simple and easy to implement solution to export your photos to Flickr from Adobe Lightroom.