The lens on the front of your camera is often an expensive piece of
glass. You need to take care of it as repairs can be very expensive.

Inside a zoom lens there are many of elements that are aligned very
precisely giving you a focused and sharp image.

A severe jolt can knock these elements out of alignment and you
wind up with soft focus (not very sharp) images.

Some years ago while studying film in LA this happened to me so
I took my Angenieux lens to the Angenieux factory for servicing.

I was amazed how these guys in there white coats put my lens into a
piece of equipment that magnified a chart showing how my lens was
working. The huge circular image pattern projected on the wall
clearly showed that at certain points the focus was off due to the
elements (pieces of glass in the lens) being out of aligment.

It wasn’t cheap to repair this problem. What I learned from this was
don’t bump the lens.

If you haven’t already done it, get a skylight or UV filter for the front
of your camera lens. These two filters don’t have any filter factor
which means they won’t absorb any light as they are mostly clear.

What they will do is protect the front element of your lens from any
damage. If someone hits the front of your lens with an object that
could scratch or break the glass, the worst that can happen is the
filter will take the punch. It’s cheaper to replace a filter than the
front element of your lens.

Here’s to good shooting.

Cheers, Barry