Quick Tip: Lens Hoods

Lens hoods have many uses. The most common use is to prevent lens flare and glare in your images. They also allow your photos to have higher contrast and more saturated colors. Both of these uses are possible because of the way a lens hood works. Basically the functional property of a lens hood is to prevent light from striking your lens at odd angles. Using a hood can also help in protecting your lenses.

You will most probably want a lens hood in the design type displayed above to prevent weird vignetting issues from occurring in your images. One thing to remember when using a lens hood with your camera’s built-in flash is that you may run into an awkward dark semicircle on the bottom of your images. This is because your lens hood (or lens depending on size) is obstructing the effective flash range of your built-in flash.

Thanks for posting this. I always suspected the built-in flash was causing the semi-circle problem, but never could find anything that outright says so. Now, write something about external flashes.

@olivia: Glad to help!