Lens flair vs. Lens flare

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Above- Lens flare from a Nikon 18-55 G VR lens with nano-crystal coating

Lens flair: notice the light grey, or white coloration  of the lens below, and the snazzy red stripe. Its a canon L lens. I'm told that the "L" Stands for "luxury". Having never used one; I don't feel qualified to comment on the actual luxuriousness of an "L lens". I can tell you in fact, that If I owned a cannon , and a light colored L lens, It would end up looking black like most of my Nikon plastic "G" lenses, because I carry my camera everywhere I go, and I go to some dirty places. 

Often times I'll find myself covered in cutting oil, welding slag, or grease from an automobile when I decide I want to take a picture. For instance; I was replacing the spark plugs on my Ford Expedition the day I took the picture of this osprey.

 I had just un-contorted myself from under the hood, and walked over to the welding table to get a sip of my Gatorade. It was really hot out that day and Cowboy (the welder) took the opportunity to  heckle me. He claimed that my truck would never run again because I removed the spark plugs and the Chevy dealership told him that it took a special tool and $500.00 to change the spark plugs in his Ford truck.

 In the midst of our exchange I looked up and saw the osprey swoop down and grab this good sized fish from the pond. I thought to myself, " too bad I don't have my camera in hand." Turns out; this fish was close to the maximum capacity that an osprey can fly with, and the bird literally had to circle the pond a few times to achieve the altitude it needed to clear the shop. ( And they say an African swallow can carry a coconut!?)

 I ended up with time to go retrieve my camera and snap a few frames as it finally came by. The lens I used was the Quantaray 70-300. It was early afternoon and the background was just a bland blue sky. That makes for a really boring picture so I moved the osprey to the lower left hand corner of the frame,because it contained a cloud. I finished it off with some synthetic lens flare via photoshop. The lens flare really gave the picture the flair it needed.