67mm Filters

pinktrainers

pinktrainers

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Another help-me-out thread, I'm afraid. I've got a Nikon 18-70 DX on the way, and hopefully will be buying a 70-300 in the near future, so I'm looking for some filters for travelling around Europe, shooting landscapes.

The two kinds of filter I'm after are a circular polariser, and a ND that isn't graduated. I'm not looking for a UV because I've heard mixed things about their usefulness, and I'm planning on taking very good care of my lenses.

Basically, the dilemma I face is that there are just too many options, and I'm not sure how to budget for value. Jessops' CP is £25, 7dayshop is selling theirs for £5.49, and I don't know the difference between Hoya's range of CPs, let alone other, better brands.

On the ND front, I'm not sure which stop would be best, or if a range is better, which few. I'm looking to use ND filters to capture silky water and cloud movement in very brightly lit conditions, any advice on what to go for is really appreciated.

All suggestions will be helpful, but please bear in mind that I am not looking for a top-of-the-range solution - just a filter that will not damage image quality by a reasonably noticeable degree. These filters will not be spending a huge amount of time on my glass, so there's no need for them to be perfect.

Cheers!
 
I'm no expert by far, but I've bought a few cheap filters & rapidly took them off!

They seemed to cause alsorts of focussing problems & led to many pics being soft & blurred.

I have a couple of CP filters, but only use them on landscapes as they do not demand such perfect focus & sharpness.

Think I'm gonna stick with lens hoods.

Mick
 
pinktrainers said:
Another help-me-out thread, I'm afraid. I've got a Nikon 18-70 DX on the way, and hopefully will be buying a 70-300 in the near future, so I'm looking for some filters for travelling around Europe, shooting landscapes.

The two kinds of filter I'm after are a circular polariser, and a ND that isn't graduated. I'm not looking for a UV because I've heard mixed things about their usefulness, and I'm planning on taking very good care of my lenses.

Basically, the dilemma I face is that there are just too many options, and I'm not sure how to budget for value. Jessops' CP is £25, 7dayshop is selling theirs for £5.49, and I don't know the difference between Hoya's range of CPs, let alone other, better brands.

On the ND front, I'm not sure which stop would be best, or if a range is better, which few. I'm looking to use ND filters to capture silky water and cloud movement in very brightly lit conditions, any advice on what to go for is really appreciated.

All suggestions will be helpful, but please bear in mind that I am not looking for a top-of-the-range solution - just a filter that will not damage image quality by a reasonably noticeable degree. These filters will not be spending a huge amount of time on my glass, so there's no need for them to be perfect.

Cheers!
Click to expand...

Your last sentence is a contradiction bud - why doesn't it matter? Might as well save even more money and not get anything at all.

Polariser - Hoya HD or Pro-1.

ND - B+W 10 stops. There is a cheaper and better alternative (LightCraftWorkshop ND500) but it's 77mm only.
 
Hoppy beat me to it; was going to say the same thing.

The old saying goes, "buy cheap, buy twice", and that's generally very true for photography. The more corners you cut, the more it affects the outcome (i.e. photographs).

Personal opinion - I'm a sucker for spending more than I should though... ;)
 
Yeah, I see what you guys mean but I meant that since only a handful of my shots will be using these filters, I don't want to invest a lot of money in them. £100 on a filter that will be used for 1 in 20 shots is not as sound an investment as an extra £100 on a lens I will use all the time, if you see what I mean.

I can see the Pro-1 CP on Amazon for £50, is that a reasonable price? Anyone know where I could pick up a B+W 10stop for a good price?
 
The quality of glass in a filter needs to be at least as good as the glass in the lens, so expect to pay at least £50 for a good un. It will be money well spent.
Andy.
 
Android said:
The quality of glass in a filter needs to be at least as good as the glass in the lens, so expect to pay at least £50 for a good un. It will be money well spent.
Andy.
Click to expand...

Unfortunately this statement is absolute nonsense.

The difference between a cheap lens and an expensive lens is generally well documented and multifaceted - build quality, focusing speed, usability, features, optical quality, aperture, sharpness, color rendition, speed.

The difference between a cheap filter and an expensive filter is not really documented by anybody, and from my casual experience is non existent.

Spend £30 on a Hoya CPL filter and Bob's yer uncle. Spend the other £20 on a taxi to the mountains to take some pictures.

You'll get better photos that way, you won't by blowing wads of cash on brand name must-have pieces of transparent flat glass.
 
Perhaps one way to save money, if that is a factor, could be to try a good quality linear polariser, I know they aren't suppose to work on auto-focus cameras, but I used a cokin LP that was from my manual days on a F601, which was auto-focus, and it worked fine. When I bought the D50, I did buy a CP as they were not to expensive at 52mm, but since needing a 67mm one for a 70-300 which are much more expensive,I have tried the linear type and it seems to work fine. Pehaps you could try one first before committing yourself to buying one
Just a thought
 
loplyg said:
Unfortunately this statement is absolute nonsense.

The difference between a cheap lens and an expensive lens is generally well documented and multifaceted - build quality, focusing speed, usability, features, optical quality, aperture, sharpness, color rendition, speed.

The difference between a cheap filter and an expensive filter is not really documented by anybody, and from my casual experience is non existent.

Spend £30 on a Hoya CPL filter and Bob's yer uncle. Spend the other £20 on a taxi to the mountains to take some pictures.

You'll get better photos that way, you won't by blowing wads of cash on brand name must-have pieces of transparent flat glass.
Click to expand...

The biggest difference between filters is coated and uncoated. Multicoating is better still, but less so.

Don't buy a cheap polariser, especially if you want to use it on a longer lens, which magnifies the loss of sharpness you get with a low quality polarising layer.

All filters, even the best, produce some flare and ghosting with digital, particularly noticeable with bright lights against darker backgrounds (sunsets, night scenes etc).

Edit: a linear polariser will upset most metering systems rather than AF, but in practise you'll find it pretty hard to buy one at all - hardly anybody stocks them these days and they're not really any cheaper.
 
I'm now picking up a Marumi DHG CP off of a fellow TPer for £15. I can see they go for about £50 so I'm hoping that'll be good enough quality (and looking at it, the Super version goes for over £100! How good can a filter be?!).

Just the ND to sort out, now.
 
One of the 'other' threads about filters just linked to a very nice Polish review of several popular makes:

Hoya HMC and Pro-1 came out top when they tested UV filters.
I would assume their CPL filters to be equally good.
 
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