Didn't the lenses come with fitted lens caps. Leave them on anytime your are not using the lens and it is the best protection there is. Glass filters are thin glass and shatter easily providing little or no protection and can actually damage the front element if glass shards are driven into the lens by a blow. The few times one might be on an ocean beach on a windy day a filter is a good idea to protect the lens from blowing sand and salt, but those kinds of needs to protect the lens front element are rare.

Quote:
Didn't the lenses come with fitted lens caps. Leave them on anytime your are not using the lens and it is the best protection there is. Glass filters are thin glass and shatter easily providing little or no protection and can actually damage the front element if glass shards are driven into the lens by a blow. The few times one might be on an ocean beach on a windy day a filter is a good idea to protect the lens from blowing sand and salt, but those kinds of needs to protect the lens front element are rare.

Interesting take on the subject. Most of the photographers I know swear by simply using a basic UV filter, that it keeps the original lens rather sharp and clean. Before every photoshoot, I clean my front filters, and it saves time with getting into the edges of the lens to remove dust/dirt particles trapped at the very edges.

As David said, a UV filter is poor protection at best, and the times you might need one to protect your lens from environmental damage are few and far between. My lens caps stay on except when I'm actually shooting.

There's another point beyond the protection myth: Anything you put in front of your lens between it and the subject is going to have an effect on the quality of the image. Yes, that's also true of other filters that we use for various effects with B&W film, such as yellow and graduated neutral density filters, but using those is a conscious tradeoff to achieve a desired result. And, of course, if you don't shoot B&W, it's not an issue for you.

Put the UV filter in your bag and save it for when you want to shoot a sand storm in the Arizona desert. And, find your lens caps!