All Posts Tagged Tag: ‘review’

Data Alliance, LLC – They could do so much better… If only…

The employees at Data Alliance, LLC, could do a better job of maintaining their ordering system.  An order I placed went unnoticed from the 6th of January to the 18th of January.  This order went through the Google Wallet payment processing service.  The explanation from the employee at Data Alliance, LLC, stated that they do not interface well with this system, and that the manager would be the only one who could take care of these orders.  It was unfortunate that the Google status stated that my item shipped on the 9th of January, and I waited until the 16th of January to make my first attempt at contacting the company.

I called after-hours and left a message with my contact telephone number on the 16th of January.  I received no response on the 17th, and again left a voicemail on the company’s answering machine with my contact information that evening.  Just after leaving the message, I sent an email with the information.  On the 18th of January, I received a phone call from a representative that stated he would talk to his manager and reply to me via email about my order.  Later that evening, past the closing time for Data Alliance, LLC, I received no email, and sent another email to ask why I received no further contact.

On the 19th of January, I phoned in during my lunch break at work, to attempt to contact a representative of the company.  The person who answered the phone was the same guy as on the 18th of January.  He finally spoke to his manager while I was on the phone, and the representative came back to state that the order never made it to shipping and that he can’t do anything else but send it off to them to get it shipped.

Questioning why the Google order status showed them as shipping out the order on the 9th of January, he had no response to that, other than it was an incompatibility between Google Wallet payment processing and their in-house invoicing system.

The representative was quick to state that they wouldn’t do anything for the mix up, and wasn’t much of any help overall, besides talking to a manager to make them push my order through.  To this day, the 27th of January, I have yet to receive any sort of compensation for the shipping cost, a measly 8 dollars that I suggested would be nice of them.  Even asking for so much as a coupon for a future order seemed like it would happen only if hell froze over.

Hoya 58mm UV S-HMC Haze Filter Review

I recently purchased the Hoya 58mm UV S-HMC Haze Filter from B&H Photo Video.  This UV filter is attached to my Canon 50mm f/1.4 prime lens.  One of the first problems I noticed with the filter was the very noticeable flare showing up as a greenish color when pointed towards the sun.  This was expected considering even without the filter, the lens would pick up a ton of flare.

One moment while shooting with the filter on, a flare caught me by surprise.  My flash was reflecting off of the prescription glasses my mom wears.  Two bright green flares coming right out from them.  This bothers me, especially since it is marketed as being a “low flare” model, the S-HMC.  The fact is, placing a flat piece of glass in front of your lens will create it’s own flare, but as protection from drops and moisture, there shouldn’t be a green flare showing up in your pictures.

*Edit*
After doing further test shots with the filter, the “flare” that I saw off my mother’s glasses was not flare so much as it was just glare from the flash. The glasses that she wears combined with the filter caused the flash reflection to become green.

I know the UV filter has its uses, foggy days, shooting pictures at the beach, but when you start getting bright green flares in your pictures, it gets irritating fast. Although the possibility of having lens flare in your images, the filter does a great job at protecting the lens and creating a little better contrast in my images.