Strange Lens Flare

[Rockislandflies]

Hi I just purchased a Sony A5000. While taking shots with bracketing I experienced very strange lens flare. I have owned a few brands and have never seen this kind of flare. Is this lens faulty. hex shaped with lines throughout.

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

[michelb]

Which lens ?

 

Any filter used ?

[Rockislandflies]

Kit lens shot at f22, no filter.....

[addicted2light]

The hexagon shape is determined by the shape of the aperture.

 

On cheaper lenses (kit zooms, for example) many manufacturers don't bother to round off the aperture blades too much (and in any case at f/22 very few lenses keep a perfectly round aperture anyway, no matter the price).

 

The lines in the flare are probably what's colloquially referred to as "onion rings", and are due the aspherical elements in the lens.

 

An aspherical element has residual "steps" that depends by the machine / process used to give it its aspherical shape. The better the lens, the smoother are these steps, and the less onion rings you're gonna see.

 

Actually this was one of the strong points that Sony put forward in their press release for the new über-expensive G series of lenses, whose manufacturing is supposedly so high-level than their aspherical elements are perfectly smooth to give you perfect bokeh without rings in it.

 

If you don't like the rings, the cheaper solution is to use for this kind of shots a lens without aspherical elements in it, for example some kind of legacy glass.

[Rockislandflies]

Would shooting at say f11 or f14 alleviate some of that effect or would I have had to go higher like f8 or f9?

[Golem]

The only thing that strikes me a strange about the

flare is that there is a random cluster of them. I'm

suspecting you have a hint of spray on your lens,

which acts as tiny lenses in a random array. 

  

One or more ghosts of the iris shape is perfectly

normal for the lighting, but an unusual and random

cluster is unusual. Thaz why I suspect some spray.

[addicted2light]

Would shooting at say f11 or f14 alleviate some of that effect or would I have had to go higher like f8 or f9?

 

 

Look at your lens pointing the camera at yourself and stopping down the aperture back and forth while you do this, and see if you can spot the shape of the aperture blades at the various f/stops. If one of the f/ values has a more rounded shape than at that value that's the shape your reflections are going to have.

 

As for onion rings, like I said the only option is using a lens without aspherical elements in it (or a really expensive one with aspherical elements extremely "polished").

 

And like Golem correctly pointed out, keeping your lens clean can help mitigate somewhat the phenomenon.

[Rockislandflies]

Thanks guys....yeah the winds were nuts, like close to 80 km an hour and there was small sea spray on the lens. I have decided to return this camera as it is kinda none responsive, not really the right tool for me. Bought it to save a few bucks but I see now, that won't work for me and what I need. I am returning to Olympus and decided to purchase the:

OLYMPUS OM-D E-M10 II 

 

Cheers.

   

[OldNoob]

Very nice shot!! Sea Spray/Mist on your front glass. Great effect.