Glare - OK or not?

[KevinUK]

Hi all,

Sometimes shooting towards the sun can give very atmospheric pictures, but can also result in spots or circles of glare from the lenses, despite best efforts with hoods and shades.

A few years ago this would usually be considered unacceptable in a picture but (perhaps a little ironically, now that digital editing makes it easier to remove them) it seems to be becoming less of a concern to people. In fact i've even seen computer games and other virtual reality creations try hard to re-create the appearance of lens glare in order to look more 'real'.

Just wondering what people think about this. Obviously some situations and photos will demand one thing or the other, but in general should we routinely remove glare artefacts from our images, as I've done for years, or leave them alone as an honest and perhaps even expected characteristic of photography?

Cheers
kevin