Lens Hoods...a necessity?

[chaman]

Cant wait to try it then!

Thanks guys!

[Grandpaw]

Years ago my family and I were at Disney World on vacation. I was using a Nikon with a prime lens on it and was changing film and dropped the camera on the cement. It landed lens first but I had a rubber lens hood on it that took the shock out of the impact hitting the sidewalk. The lens and camera were fine and didn't even get a scratch.I can only imagine the damage if it hadn't been on the lens.I have always used lens hoods just for protection if for no other reason. I might add that I now use the petal type lens hoods that come with the lenses.

One thing that you need to keep in mind is that if you use an on camera flash and leave the lens hood on you will get a round circular shadow from the lens hood at the bottom of your pictures, so be sure and remove it if you are using the on board flash. An external add on flash will work just fine, Jeff

[realart]

Say Jeff. Everything you have said I have also experienced 1st hand. I use the petal hoods with my Nikon 70-300 & 24-85 and with the Sig 10-20. On my 50 1.8 Nikkor I got a rubber hood. For now I am just using the SB-400 flash (got it mainly for the rotating head) and yes, it does peer high enough above the petal, even with the 10-20.

I do use the hoods mainly for protection but I like to also hope there may be a bit less glare using them. That may be more a psycholgical anodyne than a fact but I am happy with the self-delusion.