Excellent CHEAP 10-stop.

realspeed said:
Now going to show my ignorance about stop filters. As I can't see any difference in say the first 2 pictures what do they actually do/achieve and why and when would you use them?

Bazza
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Was a late reply to this lol
 
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Had to change the WB - auto didn't do a very good job, went very blue! Still, very sharp & vignetting is minimal. Such a great buy.
 
The important thing with an ND filter is that colours should be accurate after correction in post processing. This is why some of the best and most expensive ones (eg Lee Big Stopper, B+W MC, Heliopan) do actually have a slight cast, but after correction in post all colours are accurate.

With some cheaper filters (I've not tried the one Phil is using) they may appear to be more neutral but if you do a critical colour check, with a Macbeth say, you may find some colours are not quite right. One area of particular weakness is infrared suppression that of course we can't see, but the camera can. If significant IR is allowed through, in some shooting conditions you get brown tinted blacks and grass that cannot be reproduced properly without throwing all the other colours out.

The only time a colour cast can become a problem is when using an ND filter with an ND grad that has a slightly different hue, but even then applying graduated correction in post is very easy with Lightroom.
 
Yet another one sold, won't see it until after Xmas but I think it will be worth the wait from what I have read on the forum.
 
Just a quick update, I ordered my 67mm version from SRB, it arrived today by normal mail, that pretty darn good this time of year, so a big thumbs up to SRB and the Royal Mail, unfortunately I won't be able to use it for a few days due the coming festivities, but will report back as soon as I get the chance to use it.
 
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Not the best image I know but it was the first chance I've have had to try out the filter today. It was a little too windy for my cheap tripod, I feel that some more money needs to spent yet again in the new year for a better tripod, Redsnapper springs to mindView attachment 2785 .
Anyway the filter allowed for a 30 second exposure and I am pretty happy considering how much my camera was moving, colours appear pretty natural to me too.
 
Just a question re flagging with long exposures. As a grad filter is used to level out the exposure for bright skies could you flag a bright sky for part of the exposure when using a 10 stopper on a long exposure?
 
Phil Young said:
Don't understand your question but if it helps you could use them both with the grad stacked onto the 10 stop...?
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I currently don't have a grad filter hence my idea of flagging the sky for part of the long exposure.....................would this be effective?
 
Ady N said:
Just a question re flagging with long exposures. As a grad filter is used to level out the exposure for bright skies could you flag a bright sky for part of the exposure when using a 10 stopper on a long exposure?
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Yes, you could. Cool idea, though I've never tried it and I think it would be tricky in practice. It'd be like dodging a print under the enlarger.

If you had say a 20 seconds exposure and held the flag in place for 15 seconds, that would give you a two stops grad effect. Holding the flag exactly in position is the difficult bit.
 
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HoppyUK said:
Yes, you could. Cool idea, though I've never tried it and I think it would be tricky in practice. It'd be like dodging a print under the enlarger.

If you had say a 20 seconds exposure and held the flag in place for five seconds, that would give you a two stops grad effect. Holding the flag exactly in position is the difficult bit.
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Bit of trial & error I guess. If I weighed up the position of where the flag needs to be in the viewfinder and get a physical point on the lens rim that should help. Just wondered if anyone had success using this method with a 10 stopper..............
 
Ady N said:
Bit of trial & error I guess. If I weighed up the position of where the flag needs to be in the viewfinder and get a physical point on the lens rim that should help. Just wondered if anyone had success using this method with a 10 stopper..............
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I just edited my post above - I mean 15 seconds for two stops, not five.

The flag would need to be very close to the lens, which makes things easier. Suggest frame up holding the flag carefully in position, start exposure, then pull flag away for the last five seconds.
 
Phil Young said:
What do you mean flagging???

Expose for the sky and bring the rest up in post.

You'll be at base ISO anyway so plenty of room to play with.
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I guess bringing an under exposed foreground back in raw would give better results than trying to do something with a blown sky so something to bear in mind when calculating the exposure. Ta.
 
HoppyUK said:
I just edited my post above - I mean 15 seconds for two stops, not five.
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So on a minute exposure the flag would need to be in place for 45 seconds to get a 2 stop reduction (ie ND .6) working on 25% transmittance? (if my workings out are right................)
 
Great find Phil nice one(y)

Have to get me one of those, been threatening to try out long exposures for a while now! Just had a look on ebay, 58mm = £19.50... Happy days
 
Phil Young said:
I did. Very good filter isn't it?
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So what aperture did you shoot at f1? ISO4?

It looks a grey day, yet the shutterspeed is high enough to freeze the people/traffic. Using the Cloudy/11 rule then shooting at 1/100s and ISO100 would require an aperture of f11. Add a 10-stop ND and you'd be at f2.8 and 1/2s.
 
Any issues with Infrared (IR) contamination with these?

What can happen is some NDs cut visible light but not IR, which can result in IR contamination of the image as you expose for the attenuated visible light if the camera has insufficient IR filtering built in.

On movies we used specific IR NDs from Tiffen or a Tiffen Hot Mirror with normal NDs. IR contamination usually was visible on black synthetic material as red noise.
 
digitalsafari said:
Any issues with Infrared (IR) contamination with these?

What can happen is some NDs cut visible light but not IR, which can result in IR contamination of the image as you expose for the attenuated visible light if the camera has insufficient IR filtering built in.

On movies we used specific IR NDs from Tiffen or a Tiffen Hot Mirror with normal NDs. IR contamination usually was visible on black synthetic material as red noise.
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I don't know what that is but if you want a RAW I can upload one.
 
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