Lens hood or not???

[ignatiusjk]

Be honest how many of you who shoot landscapes use a lens hood on your lens? Do you use it all the time or just when you feel it's needed? I generally don't use them but was wondering if maybe I should.

[BrianShaw]

Almost all of the time.

[Peter Gomena]

Ditto. An essential piece of equipment.

Peter Gomena

[Preston]

I have some rubber lens hoods, but mostly I use a darkslide to shade the lens. If the ground near the camera is highly reflective, like (say) granite or sand, I'll use a hood.

--P

[J Ney]

Negative...


I've always improvised w/ the dark slide, hat, etc...

[Howard Tanger]

Be honest how many of you who shoot landscapes use a lens hood on your lens? Do you use it all the time or just when you feel it's needed? I generally don't use them but was wondering if maybe I should.

I always use a lens hood. Howard Tanger

[Jeff Bannow]

Side question - what are the best rubber hoods on the market?

[vinny]

Jeff, the heliopan real rubber ones b&h sells.

[Frank Petronio]

I put a shallow inexpensive metal Heavystar shade on every lens for a little minimal protection and to protect the lens from rain/dust falling on it, or dropping/banging it.

THEN I shade the lens more with slides, hands, or my big fat ass.

[pdmoylan]

Film Slide or my big old hat works just fine.

[Leigh]

I have hard hoods for most of the lenses.

The others get covered by a compendium hood.

- Leigh

[Ari]

No hood for me, a darkslide will suffice.
I also like using contre-jour and don't mind the occasional lens flare.

[Shadowtracker]

Lens hood as much as possible. I need to either get a few more, or get one that fits a step up ring to transfer from one lens to the next. I prefer each lens to have it's own hood though. There is a great article on the forum about contrast improvement just by using a lens hood. Since checking that out, I use one. Any kind of substitute is better than nothing at all though.

[Peter Gomena]

I have a nice collection of images with either my hat or dark slide protruding into the frame. I have a couple more with vignetting due use of a lens shade made from a 100-sheet 4x5 film box. It was not much later that I invested in a Lee system. No more problems.

Peter Gomena

[kgm]

I use a film slide or hat as well. I'm waiting on an Ebony camera and the lens shade clip that they sell. It can hold the ground glass protector as a lens shade. Since I can check it through the ground glass, it will make me less nervous in those situations where I'm trying to hold a dark slide steady and near the edge of the photo. I suspect that a hood would provide somewhat better protection against indirect light, but providing shade from direct light seems to take care of flare problems sufficiently.

[Chris Wong]

I do not use a lens hood when I shoot. If I notice that the sun is shining directly on my lens then I install the Ebony clip on the hot shoe and clip on the ground glass protector to shade the lens.