Should I buy this Lens and Filter??

[Tim Hammond]

Hi Guys,

I am new to the DV game, and after reading these forums, I have NEARLY decided to purchase the following. Please tell me if it's a bad idea, or if there's a better or cheaper option.

I have a Panasonic NV MX-350.

I am about to purchase the following:

1. Raynox HD-6600PRO 43mm 0.66x Super Wide Angle Lens
2. Hoya 72mm UV Pro1 HMC Filter
3. King 72mm Rubber Wide Angle Lens Hood

1. Alot of people have mentioned that the Raynox 6600 is a good W/A lens, so I don't think there's a problem there.

2. I chose the particular UV filter because there's not alot around that I can find in Australia - and also because it's quite thin -
"The glass is mounted in a super slim 3mm ring (with front filter thread,) which avoids vignetting and results in a 40% weight saving over standard models. Twelve layers of super multicoating are applied to surfaces to produce an average light transmission of 99.7%!"

It's $80 Aussie dollars for the filter, so I don't know if that's a cheap model or not - Should I get something more expensive?

3. I think I need a lens hood for the 6600 - Are there good and bad ones? I can't find hardly anything - are they all pretty similar????

Thank you very much for your assistance.

Tim.

[Frank Granovski]

Tim, sounds okay. The hood just screws onto the filter's front filter threads, right? I didn't know Hoya filters were so expensive down-under---it must be an expensive one. Hoya makes several grades of filters. I believe they make the thinnest, multi-coated UV on the market.

[Yow Cheong Hoe]

Yes, the Super Hoya Multi Coated Professional series (Super HMC pro) can be as much as SGD80 per piece for those above 70mm diameter. So AU$80 is about right. And these are super thin and great filters, prevents flaring (not without, just less).

The MX350 is about 40mm wide angle (35mm film reckoning) so 0.66x is about 26mm, which is very good wide angle.

As for lens hood, the "flower" hoods are more effective to prevent vignetting but round rubber hoods are cheaper. If you are daring, you can buy a rubber hood and cut the "flower" out of it!

[Allan Rejoso]

Yeah I agree that the price of that HMC filter is rather fair. I think H stands for High Grade, very thin and supposed to be water mark resistant as well.

Yowch, very clever idea on the rubber hood.

Has anybody tried the new Raynox HD7000 with any of these Panys? Full zoom capable, very low distortion, 82mm filter, but weighs like a rock (over 300 grams!).

[Patricia Kim]

I have two wide angles lenses for the GS-100K - the Panasonic, which is excellent but unthreaded at the front (does great without filter or hood in low light conditions, by the way - all the worst home movie conditions one can think of), and the Raynox HD5000 Pro. The latter has threads, but the fit to a 62mm Tiffen filter (yes, Frank, the 1/2 gold diffusion, which I could not resist trying) I purchased was peculiar - wouldn't thread right. Bought the Hoya filter mentioned here and it fits perfectly. I really don't notice any vignetting with the filter attached, but the hood on top of that does show up in the picture at full pullback. After using a rubber hood, I've decided to go ahead and order a metal wide angle hood. First, am hoping for no vignetting. Second, it used to be a matter of using the filter to protect the expensive lens. Now with good filters expensive as well, I think a metal hood makes more sense for trying to protect the filter, too. Just two cents from the home movie set.

[Bogdan Vaglarov]

Patricia, sounds more than 2 cents to me!
Sorry for the joke.

[Frank Granovski]

Patricia, don't feel bad. When I got my 1st MX300, I went straight to my local pro cam shop and bought a Leica UV filter---$80 bucks Canadian! But guess what. It didn't fit. The threads had a different pitch or something. So, while still in the store, I returned it and bought a Heliopan slim UV ($39 Canadian). Trouble is, the Heliopan caused flaring. So now I use Cokins and Hoya, and no flaring at all. Lesson: just because it's expensive, don't mean it's good. :)

[Yow Cheong Hoe]

<<<-- Originally posted by Allan Rejoso :

Yowch, very clever idea on the rubber hood.

-->>>

When you are poor, you think of ways...

OK, I am poor, but I am also pretty DIY kind of person, so I built my own stuff.

Another idea (I might have posted this before): For light rain protection, or when you visit caves with dripping water, sew two cloth bands with velcro to strap around the camera, then sew bits of velcro on top of the strap. Take a sheet of plastic (cutting up my wife's old handbag) and use it as 'rain shelter' fastened by velcro to the straps on the camera. Problem, you'll record VERY loud 'dup, dup, dup' from rain falling on the plastic sheet.

[Patricia Kim]

Bogdan, does that mean I have to pay more than two cents? Could get pricey around here for folks.

Frank, despite the ill fit, I did use the Tiffen with the Raynox. It constantly threatened to fall off (actually did, once), but it helped a lot for what I wanted: shooting some septagenarians and octogenarians at a party - with light coming in from walls of windows so that people were constantly backlighted and also with light from a slide show shining right on performers (the center of the lenses on one person's glasses had blue spots as a result). How effective was it - it was quite good; while editing later, to "cover up" the blue spots on the eyeglasses, I tried out shifting the color to b/w and then to sepia. In b/w, you could really see the age, while in the original color, the gold diffusion really softened those lines. I think the Tiffen also cut down on flare a lot. - I would add about the Raynox that I used it at full zoom (10 on the 100k - is that horror I see on your face?) several times - shoot through was really quite good. Once again, I'm speaking strictly from the home movie point of view. The Tiffen, by the way, threads beautifully over the Hoya filter. If I end up in a similar situation this weekend, I will try them together! Good thing I'm not trying to make a living at this, eh?

[Frank Granovski]

There's nothing wrong with experimenting/learning things. That Tiffen doesn't screw on to the cam's 43mm threads? The Tiffen is a 62mm thread size? The Tiffen is for the Raynox wide angle?

[Patricia Kim]

Frank, the Tiffen is 62mm and for the Raynox. No 43mm size available (yet?) for this particular filter.

[Frank Granovski]

Thanks. "Pro" filters usually start at the 49mm thread size. Cokin makes most of their filters in all common thread sizes. That's why I like them. But you have to order them from France. Tiffen will also specially make their filters with thread sizes such as 43mm. But that will cost more.

[Allan Rejoso]

Patricia,

Image quality wise, how do you compare that of Pany wideconverter to that of Raynox 5000? Could you notice any difference?

Thanks

[Patricia Kim]

Allan, except for some barreling with the Raynox - most noticeably at 1x - I have no hesitation recommending either. The Raynox claims "600 lines/mm resolution power at the center." Couldn't find any comparable info for the Panasonic, but both have good shoot through even at 10x (keep in mind that I do things that would make most pros' hair stand on end and my idea of good shoot through is that I get an unblurred close-up of a person's face using manual focus at 10x in low or bad light conditions). http://www.supervideo.com claims the Panasonic was manufactured using Leica technology (which Panasonic licenses), but the lens itself does not indicate that. If the Panasonic had threads and I could get a hood on it, I would use it all the time; as it is, there is no vignetting and flare was really minimal shooting musicians inside at night with various kinds of light sources and surfaces (cymbals, keyboards, etc.) off which light could bounce. Absent the threads on the Panasonic, however, I will probably use the Raynox more, especially if the wide angle metal hood I've ordered proves not to contribute to vignetting at 1x. Someone else will have to speak to the issue of daylight use and scenic or panoramic photography. There are so many beautiful photos and videos of Hawaii available, why add to the bad stuff. Samuel, though, has the 6600 (is that the number?), and I think he mentioned elsewhere shooting a panorama - I assume one would do that with the wide angle if one is going to bother - and he loves that Raynox.

[Samuel Raj]

Patricia,
Yes, using Raynox 6600 pro .66x, I took some Panorama shots, It did very well. Normally I take 6 or 7 pictures using tripod, now with the wide angle, just three did perfect.

Even with 10x zoom I couldnt find any soft image, That may be because, I never changed the default factory settings of Panasonic(both sharpness and color) It also encourages me to use the camera with out removing the wide angle lens in all of the shots.

There is no visible distortion in 1x to 10x(no noticable bend doorways etc.) Only thing i notice is some star like flares when directly exposed to bright lights, because of its three layer lens construction, with out some filter or hood.

Again, I love it.