People- please, think! If you're spending over $1000 on a precision piece of optics, why would you put an cheap window pane in front of it? It sucks that filters cost a bit of money, but seriously, you need to get something that's at least multicoated, and preferably B&W or Heliopan or some other good brand. For a $200 lens, this is fine. But it breaks my heart to see this "bundled" with an $1100 L lens. Tiffen 67mm UV Protection Filter
I bought this filter to put on the front of the 18-70 DX lens on my Nikon D50. It works well and protects the front element of the lens from dust, dirt, fingerprints and whatnot.
It seems to cause a little vignetting (slightly darkened corners) at extreme wide angles (~18mm) -- but from what I've seen so far it isn't terribly noticeable, 'specially for the price.
There is a reason some filters cost $115 and others (such as this item) are less than $15. That being said, I suppose it's about 95% as good as ones that costs much more.
Pros
* doesn't rattle
* will take one for the team so your lens' front won't have to
* can serve well enough until you buy a real filter
* it's available on Amazon Prime--few filters are
Cons
* really thick ring, twice as thick as others
* vignetting due to this ring
* you'll likely want better as soon as you can afford it
As someone else commented, the filter was dirty with it arrived. This is not the first dirty Tiffen I've received. My Canon filters are always very clean. Why can't Tiffen ship a clean filter?
When I cleaned the filter with lens cleaner, a black substance started started running off the metal ring. I had to wash the entire filter with soap and water to remove this. It stained my hands.
The glass itself looks OK. But stained hands from a new filter? Not good.
By the way, Amazon shipped this small filter container in a good sized box with no packing material of any kind.
I have had one of these filters on my Nikon 18-70mm DX lens for a couple of years and had no trouble with it. So I let Amazon add one to my order when I bought the Nikon 70-300 f/4.5-5.6 VR lens. The filter ruins the performance of the 70-300 VR, the lens doesn't focus correctly and there are strange reflection patterns in the out-of-focus areas of the image when you zoom in to 100%.
This UV filter does it job to protect the lens well. The build is solid (metal construction). The glass is also descent quality.
About the performance, it absorbs some UV light. The UV light absorbtion is hardly noticeable, probably the sky 1-A and the haze filter version will absorb more UV light than this lens which is fine for me.
Now, about the one problem which is the internal reflection. I've heard many people say that it mostly happens during night or low light shooting. I found out that it is not caused directly by the low light/night situation. The internal reflection will appear when there is a strong/bright source of light in comparison to the overall exposure (the surrounding environment). To put it in example (which hopefully is easier to understand), when you take a picture of a lamp during nightime and the light is much brighter than the surrounding area then you will see the internal reflection. as you move the position of the light to be closer to the sides/corner of the picture (and not in the center of the picture), the internal reflection reduces and finally dissapear (if you move the light far enough from the center). And if the light isn't too bright/contrast compare to the surrounding environment then there will be no internal reflection. but of course most of the time, a lamp at nightime is often very bright. But the point that I'm trying to make is that the internal reflection doesn't happen all the time during low light or night time.
Additionally, the internal reflection isn't only happening at night. it can also happen in the afternoon if you are taking a picture of a sun for example. basically same rule as above, on how bright is the light source compared to the surrounding area, and as you move the sun from the center of the photo and near the side the internal reflection will move to the side/dissapear (also depending the angle). But the best way is just to remove the filter during these situations.
Hope this explanation helps you to reduce the occurence of internal reflection by identifying correctly when the internal reflection will occur and then remove the filter during those situation (which is not hard to do).
I'm actually not a fan of lens filter (any filter) as I think it will only degrade picture quality as we added another layer between the sensor and object, but I decided to use them anyway for all my lens. And I would recommend everyone to get one of this filter if you don't have any filter for your lens.
I got this filter for a friend of mine for his Nikon 18-70mm ED DX lens. - Filters - Protection - Uv Filter - Filter'
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