Cucumber's question

D

DocBedford

Member
Hey boys and girls!

Yes, I'm greener than a popular vegetable, and I have a question.

Should I buy a polarizer filter, what a photographer calls a 1A, which will protect the lense of my HVX as well as bluing the sky? A photographer friend said I shouldn't buy a polarizer because digital cams already compensate with a polarizer affect. I hesitate to believe that.

Also: I plan to buy a filter for its visual effect. What's a recommendation for a filter that helps create that mystical "film look" in a general sense? One that softens the glaringly sharp highlights and vaguely blurs those razor clean edges? Any suggestions for a good one?

Thanks!
 
A 1A isn't a polarizer. A 1A filter is a clear or "skylight" filter. A polarizer is a special type of filter that polarizes the incoming light, which can really have a significant effect on your image -- it can remove reflections from water or glass, and it can deepen and darken blue skies, etc. No camera has built-in polarizing as far as I know.

Lots of people will tell you to buy a clear, skylight, 1A, or UV filter and stick it on your lens immediately and always leave it there. If you're concerned about getting the best image, that's not good advice; any filter is going to degrade the quality of your image, and putting a cheap $10 filter in front of your nice fancy Leica Dicomar lens is just a bad idea.

Of course, getting a nick in your lens' front element because it gets hit by a rock is also a really bad idea. So if you must have a filter for protection, buy the very best, highest-quality filter you can possibly get; I normally recommend the B+W or Heliopan line. Don't get a cheap Tiffen or Hoya or Crystal Optics; there's no quicker way to degrade your image than to put one of those things in front of your lens.

For a "film look" filter, there really isn't such a thing, but if you want a simple diffusion filter look into the Pro-Mist line.
 
DocBedford said:
Hey boys and girls!

Yes, I'm greener than a popular vegetable, and I have a question.

Should I buy a polarizer filter, what a photographer calls a 1A, which will protect the lense of my HVX as well as bluing the sky? A photographer friend said I shouldn't buy a polarizer because digital cams already compensate with a polarizer affect. I hesitate to believe that.

Also: I plan to buy a filter for its visual effect. What's a recommendation for a filter that helps create that mystical "film look" in a general sense? One that softens the glaringly sharp highlights and vaguely blurs those razor clean edges? Any suggestions for a good one?

Thanks!
Click to expand...


nowadays, you almost never need a filter, except 1A, ND or Polarizer.

The post software (After efects, etc.) do a good job in that area.

The film look is not really a matter of filters, is a mater of photography and cameraman's work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top