Is there any material you can place over a lens to do the job of an ND filter?

[andrew00]

Strange question, but...

There's a new Digital Harinezumi coming out that also records sound, which is nice for those of us who like it as an option.

However, the images appear too saturated and too bright off the bat. Saturation one can fix in post, but the brightness is a pain and ruins the images.

I haven't bought one of the cameras yet, I was going to get v2 when it came out, but the images seem badly affected so might get v1 instead.

I was wondering if there was anything I could put over the lens of v2 to get it to calm down on the highlights and stop blowing them out and ruining them!

Examples:
http://vimeo.com/groups/22390/videos/7693883
http://vimeo.com/groups/22390/videos/7691047

This shows comparison between v1's faded look and v2's too hot for school look:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q64E2cdD1QU

Here's what it looks like:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kazuto_moriyama/4152484923/

I'm wondering if there's any material or anything like that I can tape to the front of the lens to just calm it down!

Maybe some kind of gel square or something? It only needs to be tiny as you can see from the image.

Cheers,
a x

 

[Richard Crowley]

Gel

Gel

Since one of its claimed "features"(?) is the low-quality image, you could probably tape a little piece of ND gel over the lens(?) opening. One of those little sample books of gel material would provide a lifetime supply...

OTOH, for $50 LESS you could get a refurb Flip with a real viewfinder, ,much better video performance (including zoom), and even quite respectable audio. And the old SD (640x480) models are even cheaper.

The Harinezumi really seems like a criminally-overpriced cheap toy. Looks like a $5 "web-cam" with memory. :lipsrseal