Lens Hoods

Lens hood can prevent unwanted light rays from entering the lens and hence reduces lens glare and ghost images. See On-Camera Lens Overview for some details and examples. Unfortunately, none of these three lens converters comes with a lens hood, and there is no Nikon-brand lens hoods available. We certainly do not expect to use a lens hood on a FC-E8 Fisheye lens. But, the WC-E80 wide angle converter does not have a thread for using a lens hood. While the TC-E15ED has a 58mm thread, Nikon does not have 58mm thread lens hood for a lens of focal length larger than 300mm. Therefore, it is difficult to find a Nikon lens hood for the TC-E15ED.

After some tests, I found the Nikon lens hood NH-30, which is built for Nikon's AFD 200mm F4 micro (SLR) lens, may be a good solution. Since the NH-30 has a 62mm thread (below left), a 58-62mm step-up ring is needed (below-right). Since the NH-30 is very deep, it shields the TC-E15ED effectively. If a polarizer is needed, it can be mounted between TC-E15ED and NH-30.

Some suggested to use Nikon's 72mm polarizer as shown in the left image below. While the 72mm polarizer has a 72mm thread, the polarizer glass is larger than 72mm. A matching Nikon lens hood HN-13 is available for this polarizer. In addition, a 58-72mm step-ring is needed as shown in the right image below.

When this combo is mounted on a 5700 as shown below, it is really very big. Moreover, if you do not want to use a polarizer, you perhaps have no way to mount the lens hood. Consequently, the NH-30 hood is more economic, smaller and more convenient.

When choosing a lens hood, thread size is not the only factor. In fact, we need to take angle of view into consideration. For example, if a lens hood made for telephoto lenses is mounted on a wide-angle converter, vignetting occurs. In the left figure below, a lens hood for normal or telephoto lens is mounted on a wide angle lens. Since the wide angle lens has a wider angle of view, part of the scene covered by the lens is cut off by the lens hood and vignetting occurs. The right figure below shows a wide angle lens hood mounted on a telephoto lens. In this case, light rays that are not within the angle of view can also reach the lens. This causes lens flare or ghost images, which defeats the purpose of using a lens hood.