[Leica] Re: UV filters and camera stores

[Jim Brick <jimbrick@photoaccess.com>]

The last Leica workshop that I taught was sponsored by a major photographic
supplier in San Francisco. I was asked, before the workshop, to not tell
people that they should not buy a UV "protection" filter when they buy a
lens, because the filter is a source of revenue for the store. So I never
mentioned UV filters. Instead, I showed everyone all of the filters that I
do use (polarizer, KR3, KR6, KB3, ND, split ND, color grads, etc.) I even
showed them my use of two Heliopan polarizers for simple M camera polarizer
use, and I simply stated that filters should be used when there will be a
"beneficial result" to the image, and that one must be very careful of
where you point a camera with filter attached. I showed appropriate slides.
So assuming there were some folks there with an IQ in at least the higher
double digits, they could extrapolate what I said in terms of the basically
useless UV filter.

The proprietor was very happy because many of these people were now going
to buy expensive, and very useful, filters. They learned when to use them,
and, almost more importantly, when not to use them.

Jim


At 09:58 AM 5/25/99 -0400, Dan Post wrote:
>
>Working in the camera store, lurking in the lab and listening to the sales
>people I have discovered a hoorible fact! The reason so many people put that
>$10 piece of glass in front of a $2000 lens is that the people who sell
>cameras usually get, at most, $10-15 dollars on the sale of a camera outfit-
>usually 500-600 dollars. If they sell a filter, a battery and some film, a
>case to put it in, they make almost as much! On a 1000 dollar camera, they
>get more money selling an extended warranty than they do selling the camera!
>It's simply economics! For the most part, I keep my mouth shut except when I
>am teaching one of our staff the niceties of taking a halfway decent photo-
>The manager, who went to photography school, will admit that for most cases,
>a filter is superfluos, but our job, as he is wont to say, is to sell what
>the man has in stock!
>Again, if experience dictates, the filters will find their place in a drawer
>somewhere, and wisdom will prevail!
>
>Dan

At 09:58 AM 5/25/99 -0400, Dan Post also wrote:

>I did the prints of some of her film, and commented that she had
>used a UV filter, and that it was on a zoom lens... and that she was not
>using a shade; she was amazed that I knew what she was using just from the
>prints, until I showed her clearly the two large amorphous flare spots
>caused by the filter.
>
>Dan again