My youngest brother, a fairly keen amateur photographer, worked in a museum and got to know the professional staff photographers. One of them had a superexpensive telephoto lens (close to, if not well over, $1000) that he had once dropped in a mud puddle; he used it as a paperweight. <img src="images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Apparently, the optics in the lens were so precise that even taking it apart and washing the mud off would have destroyed the anti-reflective coating on the lenses.

Not that I'd advocate "accidentally" dropping a $1000 camera lens into a mud puddle, but it doesn't surprise me that a front lens from a precision optical instrument (like an SLR camera lens or a pair of expensive binoculars) would outperform a cheap piece of plastic. Of course, the cheap piece of plastic fits in my wallet ... <img src="images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />