I have often said that i hate my FA50mm F1.4, sure its a sharp lens at F4.0, some say even at F2.8 but when i want the speed the sharpness
just isn't there, in fact the only fast lens i have that doesn't really suffer a lot from low sharpness wide open is my FA35mm F2.0...

In the case of the FA50, its all about low contrast, same goes for the F50 F1.7 and Sigma 24mm F1.8... and a little bit on the FA77mm F1.8 Ltd...
I know a hood is important for getting rid of stray unwanted light, but you really never no how important it is until you have a bad case of low
contrast for a given lens and you try a lens hood on it. in a personal review of the Sigma 24mm F1.8 someone wrote online they made a really
interesting point, The film (FF) lenses come with a hood that blocks stray light for the FOV related to full frame, however on a crop sensor the
hood needs to be 1.5 times longer to get the greatest benefit, he said he used his Sigma 70-200 F2.8 hood on his 24mm F1.8 without vignetting
and with far better contrast... the other thing we all should understand is that zoom lenses hoods are only good for the widest FOV...

with this in mind i picked up a lens hood off ebay said to be good for 37-90mm ore something like that, its a 49mm thread and its about 37mm
long and 60mm in diameter (it came with a 58mm lens hood)... the hood is longer then the built in hood of the 77Ltd too by about 1.3 times.

here are some of my conclusive test to confirm how much a lens hood helps

Testing back light glare 50mm F1.4 @ F1.4, F2.0, F2.8
what the test looked like


100% crops description written on photo







You can clearly see a marked improvement in contrast and overall sharpness

Now here is one test for the 77mm F1.8 at F1.8, no hood, built in hood, new hood

what the test looked like


100% crops


Look at the contrast in the text and the effect of purple ringing on the black dots

I hope this is clear for everyone now that the right lens hood is rather quite important to improve lens performance especially on fast
primes... now the next thing i have to look for is a larger hood to fit my 24mm F1.8

[vizjerei]

Thanks MightyMike. I think I need to put my lens hood back on :P

[ll_coffee_lP]

Awesome post - which makes absolutely perfect sense.

I'm a hood/no filter man myself, but I may experiment with some longer hoods just to see what my results are like.

c[_]

[paugie]

hey, I've never installed the lens hoods on my lenses since day 1. I'll open the boxes again and put them on.
thank you for the heads-up

[lesmore49]

I always use a lens hood.

[Bophoto]

I have the plastic hood for FA50, but i use Pentax Rh-Rb49 that is in rubber and it´s for F70-210 and FA70-200. But it works well on FA50 if you use a APS camera.

[ramseybuckeye]

Good article, works just like standing in a shady spot to shoot a sunny spot, usually the shadier the better.

Thanks Mike, good research!

[samski_1]

Excellent article, very helpful. I have been asking questions about this subject in the forums and then stumbled on this, thank you very much.

[troutman]

Thanks for the info Mike.....I will definitely be using my hood on the F50 in future (and invest in longer hood for same)

[Class A]

Did you put the focus to MF once the lens was focused and didn't touch it between changing hoods? Or did you refocus after applying hoods?

[nanokevin]

I have same kind of problem. Thanks for this great solution.

[Franky2step]

Sigma now offers a "hood extension" for aps-c sensors on their 85mm f1.4 and the 70-200 f2.8.......maybe other lenses as well

[PALADIN85020]

Having read of the advantages of a lens hood on the 50mm f/1.4, I invariably use a screw-in type of considerable depth that I picked up used in a camera store some time ago.

Here's a pic of the hood on the lens:



And here's an example of the results I typically get at f/8:



I'm very pleased with this lens, and I think the hood does help a lot to eliminate flare and any softness caused by light coming into the lens at an angle. Works for me!

John

[philbaum]

Having read of the advantages of a lens hood on the 50mm f/1.4, I invariably use a screw-in type of considerable depth that I picked up used in a camera store some time ago.

I'm very pleased with this lens, and I think the hood does help a lot to eliminate flare and any softness caused by light coming into the lens at an angle. Works for me!

John

John,
thanks for resurrecting this older thread. I sort of had the opinion that hoods had to be designed for the lens, when in fact, for a zoom, they are usually compromised for the wider end. But since many Pentax lenses, not all, have some standardization regarding the filter threads, one can install other hoods on them.

I have a rubber hood on my FA501.4, but i suspect i could do better with a longer hood.

The thing i like about my DA50-135 is that its got such a tremendous long hood. Not only does it probably help the contrast, but it helps keep rain off the optical lens in rain or snow situations, and the value of that should not be underestimated,

So cheers to longer hoods!

[mikeSF]

threads from the grave!
i thought i remembered reading this thread 3 years ago.

[romansolar]

thank you for research and share!