Lenskirt Anti-Reflection Portable, Flexible Lens Hood - Fits Any Lens

This simple solution to reduce reflection when shooting through glass is just what I was looking for. In the past, I used to try an improvise a solution for this problem, but nothing worked. This cheap solution not only does the trick, but it is well made, folding nicely into a flat surface of about 1/4" thick, and weight practically nothing. I would strongly recommend it to anyone who attempts to take pictures through a glass. Please remember that you still need to take care of mounting the camera, so don't forget to buy a suction-based mount to hold your camera in addition to the Lenskirt, if you don't have one yet.

When it comes to shooting through a window without capturing reflections from the window glass, there are a number of solutions. None of them are perfect.One approach is to position your lens up against the glass and wrap a jacket around the end of it to block out any room light that might cause reflections. This technique can work but it is awkward. Obtaining a light seal can be difficult, and It leaves the photographer with only one hand to operate the camera. The best thing about it is that it is free.Large diameter silicone lens hoods have become popular in recent years but they have their own problems. In theory, this design allows the hood to create a seal against the window to block out all room light while being flexible enough to aim a camera up or down or sideways without breaking the seal. But this approach has problems too. First, the hole through which the end of the lens is designed to fit is usually so small that users are left wondering if they are going to damage their lens or rip the silicone hood trying to attach it. Both can happen. Second, these silicone hoods tend to be floppy. The result is that only one hand is available for controlling the camera because the other one is required to hold the hood against the glass. Third, once a silicone hood is stretched tightly over the front of a lens, any ring that gets covered becomes difficult if not impossible to use. Zoom lenses with extending barrels can be a problem. And Canon's RF lenses are particularly problematic because their control rings, usually positioned at the end of the lens, are almost always covered. Although I own more than one of these silicone lens hoods, the hassle of using them keeps them in a drawer instead of my bag.This brings us to the Lenskirt. The Lenskirt is lightweight—lighter than a silicone hood (or your jacket)—and folds flat. It is not small enough to fit in a pants pocket. It might fit in a large jacket pocket. It will definitely fit in just about any bag. In use, it is shaped like a cinema camera matte box. There is a suction cup attached to each of its four corners which allows the user to position it on the window before attaching a camera to it. The Lenskirt is unique in this way. The approach frees up both hands to use for shooting.The front of the Lenskirt is constructed of flexible foam covered in a lightweight Cordura-like fabric. The foam provides enough structure to give the Lenskirt its shape but not so much to prevent it from being folded. The back of the Lenskirt is made of a cotton-like black cloth with an opening that can be tightened around the front of a lens using an elastic cord—similar to the way some teleprompters work. Unlike a silicone hood, there is no fight to insert a lens, regardless of diameter, into the Lenskirt. However, tightening it down around a lens with one hand while the other holds the camera takes some practice.Once the front of the Lenskirt is attached to the glass and the back is tightened around the user's lens, he or she is left with a largely but not completely dark environment. There is some light leakage along the edges which slightly reduces the area of reflection-free glass available to shoot through. This is the primary reason why I would describe the Lenskirt solution as imperfect despite it being my preferred solution.TechniqueThe soft black cloth used at the back of the Lenskirt allows the user to tilt and/or shift the camera up, down, left, right, and even into the Lenskirt to best utilize the area of reflection-free glass created by it. I found that a good approach is to position the end of the lens as close to the surface of the glass as possible. Doing so creates the greatest latitude for angling the camera without experiencing physical vignetting from the Lenskirt.I've read some reviews that specifically complain about the suction cups—either they're hard to get off or they get lost or they don't stick as well as they should. My own experience is that they work fine. I've left a Lenskirt attached to a window in my home and it stayed there indefinitely. Each suction cup has a little tab on it to aid in its removal. I make a point of positioning these tabs so they are sticking out when I attach the Lenskirt to glass. This makes removing them trivial. I never "rip" the Lenskirt off of the glass.Which size: standard or XL?A common question when purchasing a Lenskirt is which size is best. I tested both. I was surprised to discover that the XL size is a standard Lenskirt with an extra 2.5" of material on the end. All of the angles are the same. Because of this, it seems fair to describe the XL as "deeper" rather than "wider". Put another way, while the XL version creates a larger area of reflection-free glass, it leaves your lens farther away from it. I could get my lens up against the glass with the standard size. I could not with the XL. Because of this, I felt like the standard size allowed me to shoot at a wider variety of angles than the XL. This is the opposite of what I expected.So what is the advantage of the XL? Well, it does create a larger area of reflection-free glass. In my testing, I was using a lens, primarily an RF 24-105mm F4L with hood, that was not long enough at 24mm to get up against the glass when using the XL. If it had been long enough, then I would have benefited from the XL's larger working area. There may be other advantages as well. In the end, I only kept the standard size Lenskirt. It was a much easier decision than I had expected.The Bottom LineEvery solution for shooting through glass is imperfect in some way. I find the Lenskirt to be the best choice. It's the easiest to use and its drawbacks are minimal. It eliminates reflections with the least amount of hassle.

I used this for pictures in a tour bus and shinkansen in Japan. Works great.

PROS: I tried dozens of solutions and found this to be the best reflection-blocking tool out there. It was worth the price.CONS: I purchased one of each size of these in 2018, then another set in 2021. Perhaps because of a part swap due to supply issues, the suction cups on the newer set performed much worse than the original set. The new ones could not be trusted to stay stuck to glass for more than a few minutes, less if the glass was cold or even slightly dirty. This might be ok for one-off shots, but unreliable for long-term projects like time lapses. I had this problem across a variety of windows, even after cleaning the window and cups first. The reduction in performance is very disappointing - please bring back the old, better, suction cups!OTHER: If your suction cups are working but you're still getting light leaks, ensure that you've set up the skirt so that the edges flaps are flat against the window. Get your camera as close to the window as possible. Note that some window designs with coatings, thick panes, or multiple panes around air gaps, are going to have reflections regardless of any skirt or hood (it's just physics). Wide angle lenses will be more susceptible.

Traveling for a destination wedding in NYC and knew I would want to get some shots out of the window as the reception venue had awesome skyline views. This didn't disappoint and I was able to grab some great stills and video during the cocktail hour that would have looked a bit silly draping a tablecloth over with 100s of guests around. A simple solution that yes, can be DIYed, but the pro solution for a fair price offers suction cups that won't fall off or get mis-aligned (for Time-Lapse when the shots go on for a while) and drawstring for added light blocking. Would highly recommend if you think you will find yourself in a situation where you are taking hotel room photos through glass. Only time this didn't work was when I got back to my hotel room and the Marriott had double glass windows so while it cut out the reflection from the first glass I still got hotel room light reflections from the second layer of glass. Just something to consider!

The plastic suction cups keep being detached from the hood. Also, the system doesn’t work properly if you are shooting with an angle with the window - you would need the larger size for this.

Worked well for a short time. One of the suction cups fell out and got lost. I attempted contact with the seller multiple time to try to buy extra suction cups to fit the corners. Calls were never returned so good product with NO support.

Try it once so far and does the job it needs to do, keeps the reflection out, which i was finding annoying in my pictures and now get better pictures has long has the glass its stuck to is clean. The only reason i went down a star is i think its a bit pricey for it, but nothing else really on the market to challenge it or to buy, so overal if you had enough of reflections in your images and got a DSLR camera, this will be worth getting.