Is okay to leave WD-58H on GL2 instead of puting it on when needed. Any downside?

Thanks,
James

It's fine, James. I leave mine on the camera most of the time. No downside.

Thanks Ken.

Since WD-51H does not have front thread, any alternate that has front thread and hood.

As a matter of interest, why would you need a front thread on the
WD-51H ? What would you screw onto it? A filter (if you could get one) would be huge and bound to show up any dust etc.
If there was anything suitable, surely Canon would have designed the lens with a front-thread anyway.
As for a lens hood, there is one made for it.

Robin.

Quite right Robin. . . maybe a MAtte box nicley tucked under the cammie on Rails? NOW that wouldmbe real neat . . ! HAHAHA

Grazie

I was thinking adding a UV filter in front of WD-58H, seems I don't need to. Thanks all for the advise.

Do I still need UV filter between the camera lens and WD-58H.

No. It would serve no purpose whatsoever and would push the 58 just slightly out of position with respect to the primary lens.

Doesn't a UV filter have *some* value? I know that most people use them as lens protectors, but don't they protect the CCDs or something like that?

No. None.

UV filters were designed to extract cash from the pockets of still film photographers by preventing "excess" ultraviolet band radiation from entering the lens and casting a bluish color on film. It has no relevence to video. Videographers buy these things to protect their front element.

Actually... A UV filter between your WD-58 and your XM2 can serve a purpose...

by moving the WD-58 further away from the cameras lens, it increases the wide angle effect by 1 or 2 degrees. I first noticed it when I had a UV & a Diffusion in there, (just to experiment with, in early days of shooting I'd often test weird combinations of filters in varying light to see what would happen) the stills I'd taken onto memory card had the edges rounded off as black. however nothing erroneous showed on the video I'd shot, I guess its cos when taking stills more of the CCDs area is used.

The video I'd shot definitely had a more bulbous look to it. Could come in handy when trying to cover a lot of action close up. I'm shooting a band on Thursday, I love being really close to performers & getting busy, interesting shots, I'll defnitelly be going as wide as possible for that

Downsides are that moving the Wide Angle Adaptor away from the camera body moves the centre of gravity further forward, making the camera less evenly balanced, and more of a strain to hold. It might also stress the camera body.

I'd reccomend the century optics .65x wide angle adaptor over the WD-58
http://www.centuryoptics.com/products/dv/camera/1.htm

Its lighter, smaller & distorts the image less.

Happy shooting,

Hagop