T2i Image quality difference between 80$ and 160$ Hoya polarizing filters?

A

altar

Active member
Hi all,

I'm trying to pick a polarizer filter and I'm wondering if there's a real difference in image quality between the medium and high priced ones.
Is there a noticeable difference in image quality or is more about durability?

Thanks
 
For video, probably not but I wouldn't go for the cheapest either. I normally buy the middle of the road filters and haven't had any issues with them yet.
 
I've posted this several times over the last 6 months - I've used cheap chinese glass screw-ons as I built up my 4x4's; did an outdoor shoot and I could find no difference between glass 4x4, resin 4x4, and super-cheap screw-on polarizers, faders, and ND. The DSLR compression seems worse than any filter you can buy (though I've never touched the plastic screw-ons...) If you're in a jam for ND or faders, check eBay and get something you can at least work with. (And when you buy a scarlet or Af100, be prepared to upgrade).
 
Hi Michael,
I've been trying to send you a private message, but the system is buggy so I don't think that you ever got it.
I only have low quality lenses (canon 50mm 1.8, 18-55mm) for my 550D so maybe even the 80$ Hoya is overkill, I don't know, especially since there seems to be some spring and cap issues with the model I was planning to buy.
Is there any brand in particular that you would recommend?

Thank you
 
Got your message (twice!) & replied - but essentially, I had good results with no-brand glass circular filters. If I can find them around here, I'll try to do a test with raw stills sometime out of curiosity. I don't have a test chart, but just putting a light on something like a software package and focusing on the text and noting f-stops is a good way to test for relative sharpness between lenses or accessories.

Try it with your lenses sometime - you'll be surprised how soft even good lenses are at the extreme ends of their f-stop range. I have some nice lenses that are noticeably weak at 2.8 and don't really sharpen up til 4 or 5.6. It's good info to know.
 
I have never had problems with cheap (am i mean CHEAP) filters until recently. I was shooting on a golf course and i threw on a CPL to stop down a touch and get a nicer green from the grass and blue from the sky. After a few shots i looked at the footage and found that it all had a blue pull on the one side. IMG_4477.jpg

Here is a still that was shot with that filter in the same conditions.

This was down at f/2 on a 28mm lens. I still saw this pull as high as f/5.6 but i never shot over that so i don't know if it would have gone away. In the stills it was problematic. In the video you cant really tell its there at all.
 
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