Pfff - what's wrong here?

[scottvd]

Working on those guy senior pictures I was asking for help on earlier - I have two shots here direct from the camera with this nasty glare. Why is it green? What am I doing to get this in the photos? Aperture too wide? How can I avoid this? I shot with the appropriate hood on my lens. The second photo has a huge section covered by this "green film" - the whole upper right corner.. blast!

Thanks in advance,
Scott Vander Dussen

[gstark]

Scott,

In the first image, that looks like it may either be some sort of reflection that's been captured on the sensor, or else it's an intermittent fault on the sensor. I've seen both occur, but very occasionally.

In the second, I'm seeing an image that appears to be slightly over-exposed, and also doesn't have the correct wb. That's where I think the green is coming from here. Start by pulling the exposure back a little, and then (you did shoot these in raw, right?) give the wb a little nudge.

As it happens, I also think that the wb in the first is also not quite right, but here it's a little warm, but not unpleasantly so. For this image, crop this into a tight portrait orientation of just (mainly) your subject, removing the glare from the doorway as well as the green aberration.

[DaveB]

I'd hazard a guess and say that you had a "UV/whatever" filter on your lens, and that this is a reflection of the bright area on the left. You can see from the line that I've drawn that it's directly opposite across the centre of the lens.
This is one of those times you definitely DON'T want a filter on your lens (or want to have spent lots of $$ on a filter that's well coated to try to reduce the likelihood of this happening).

As for the 2nd image, that IS flare that you can see. A hood will protect against bright lights coming from the side, but here the flare is being caused by the bright areas within your field of view. Again, your UV filter is partly to blame here!
Exposure/processing decisions (as per Gary's comments) can help here (e.g. increasing the Blacks slider in ACR can help hide it) but the underlying problem is a physical one on the front of your lens.

Shooting with a hood is great: keep it up. Not only because it will help your images, but also because it will help protect the front of your lens when you're shooting without that filter.

[aim54x]

I am with Dave on this one....the first looks like a reflection on your UV filter....cheap filters are notoriously bad for this as well, but I have also seen it happen with expensive Hoya (Super HMC) filters.

[scottvd]

Awesome - thanks so much for the responses. Yes, I do have a UV filter, I got it as a free surprise in a cracker jack box - Tiffen HAZE 1 [62mm on my 85mm/1.8] to be exact. (: I had no idea that would happen, but I've read and understand more about coatings - I'm guessing you wouldn't agree with what Ken Rockwell has to say here then:

"If you use these stepping rings you probably won't be able to use a standard hood. I never use hoods so I don't worry. Lens coatings have made hoods obsolete for decades, except as prophylaxis (protection). Your hand provides much better shielding against the sun."

I've tweaked that photo a bit and have this result:


You can still see it, but not as bad - super frustrating! Perhaps this is a difficult question to answer, but would you say the flare was caused by the angle/light and couldn't be avoided no matter what - or was it present, and intensified by my cheap filter and if I had used either no filter or a coated filter it wouldn't have showed up?

Thanks in advance,
`S

[aim54x]

was it present, and intensified by my cheap filter and if I had used either no filter or a coated filter it wouldn't have showed up

I would say it was intensified by the filter although it may not necessarily be a cheap one. Using no filter should keep it at bay (not sure if the TIffen is coated)

[DaveB]

I'm guessing you wouldn't agree with what Ken Rockwell has to say here then:

"If you use these stepping rings you probably won't be able to use a standard hood. I never use hoods so I don't worry. Lens coatings have made hoods obsolete for decades, except as prophylaxis (protection). Your hand provides much better shielding against the sun."

Ken does sometimes have good points to make, but he often misses the mark overall.
Actually, if you read his About page you will see telling things like this:

I love a good hoax. Read The Museum of Hoaxes, or see their site. A hoax, like this site, is done as a goof simply for the heck of it by overactive minds as a practical joke.

It amazes me that people continue to refer to Ken's site as gospel.

See the separate discussion on the use of filters and/or hoods for more relevant opinions not related to Ken...