Lens Hood

A lens hood is a plastic, rubber, or metal shade that attaches to the front of a lens. It blocks light coming from outside the frame, which would otherwise bounce around inside the lens and create flare or a hazy, low-contrast look. It also protects the front glass from bumps, rain, and fingerprints. Most lenses ship with a matching hood designed for their field of view.

Yes, in difficult light. By blocking stray light, a hood prevents flare spots and veiling haze, so photos keep deeper blacks and stronger colors. In flat, even light the difference can be invisible, because there is no stray light to block. The hood contains no glass, so it never degrades the image, which makes it one of the few accessories with an upside and no optical downside.

Many photographers leave the hood on permanently. It never hurts image quality and it protects the lens between shots. The exceptions are practical: a hood can shadow a pop-up flash, make a polarizing filter hard to rotate, or add bulk in a tight camera bag. Some photographers also remove it on purpose to let flare into the image for a warm, hazy look.

A photo's frame is rectangular, so the image reaches further toward the diagonal corners than toward the edges. Petal hoods, also called tulip hoods, are cut shorter at the corners so they shade as much light as possible without appearing in the picture. They must click into the correct position, because a rotated petal hood shows up as dark corners. Round tube hoods avoid the problem on telephoto lenses, which see a narrower view.

A correctly matched hood does not. Vignetting appears when the hood intrudes into the lens's field of view. A hood built for a telephoto lens is too deep for a wide-angle lens, and a petal hood twisted out of position puts its long petals into the corners of the frame. Using the hood designed for that specific lens, clicked into its proper position, keeps the frame clear.

Yes. The hood extends past the front element, so it absorbs knocks and scrapes before they reach the glass. It also keeps rain, snow, and stray fingerprints off the front element. A broken plastic hood costs far less than a lens repair. Some photographers rely on the hood for protection instead of a UV filter, since a hood adds no glass to the light path.

Yes. Flare is not limited to sunlight. Streetlights, car headlights, and stadium floodlights sit outside the frame at night and cause the same reflections inside the lens. A hood blocks them the same way it blocks the sun. Night scenes are high in contrast, so flare and haze can be even more visible than in daylight.

No. A hood contains no glass and blocks only light coming from outside the picture. The light that forms the image passes through untouched, so exposure, sharpness, and autofocus all stay the same. This is the difference between a hood and a filter: a filter sits in the light path and changes the image, while a hood only shades the lens.

Yes. Filters screw into the thread on the front of the lens, while most hoods attach to a bayonet mount on the outside of the barrel, so they do not compete for space. The one annoyance is a polarizing filter, which must be rotated to work. A deep hood makes the filter ring hard to reach, so many photographers set the filter first or pull the hood off for a moment.

Most hoods reverse. Flipping the hood around and mounting it backward over the lens barrel makes the lens shorter and easier to pack. The hood must be flipped forward again before shooting, since a reversed hood shades nothing and often covers the focus or zoom ring. Photographers who find the flip tedious can leave the hood mounted forward and pack the camera with more room.