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- Chris
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I've had a CPL filter in my bag for a couple of years, and never used it. It's only a cheapo Jessops own brand that it appears came from my son (see a much earlier thread where I asked about them). But since I was near the end of a film after our few days in Wales last week, I thought I should experiment. Out to the fields behind Kenilworth Castle, and I took 2 shots in quick succession, as below. Both with the CPL mounted, first minimum polarising effect:
Second with the polariser turned to maximum effect (the sun to the left and a bit behind in both shots):
I did intend the exposure to be the same, but I was unused to using the CPL filter, and found I needed to hold the camera differently than I usually do, and kept changing the focus and/or aperture rings while trying to turn the polariser. So I'm guessing I moved the aperture and then forgot to meter off the grass in the second one.
To me the difference in the skies is startling, and suggests I should have been using a polariser much more with colour film. I've been experimenting with over-exposing negative film, AND metering for the shadows, and as you may know from elsewhere I've been having trouble with sky highlights. I think the polariser would have helped in several of those situations (not all, since as far as I understand it they work best sideways to the direction of the sun, rather than towards or away from the sun). Even the grass seems more saturated.
Should I be investing in a better quality CPL?
BTW the Camera was Pentax MX of course, film was Reala 100 (expired 2007), shot at 64. I've been shooting it at 80, and getting rather delicate, pastel colour, as in my pictures from the Greenwich Meet. Shooting at 64, even if it's only a third of a stop faster, seems to give a more saturated look anyway, even without the CPL. Is that what I should expect?
Second with the polariser turned to maximum effect (the sun to the left and a bit behind in both shots):
I did intend the exposure to be the same, but I was unused to using the CPL filter, and found I needed to hold the camera differently than I usually do, and kept changing the focus and/or aperture rings while trying to turn the polariser. So I'm guessing I moved the aperture and then forgot to meter off the grass in the second one.
To me the difference in the skies is startling, and suggests I should have been using a polariser much more with colour film. I've been experimenting with over-exposing negative film, AND metering for the shadows, and as you may know from elsewhere I've been having trouble with sky highlights. I think the polariser would have helped in several of those situations (not all, since as far as I understand it they work best sideways to the direction of the sun, rather than towards or away from the sun). Even the grass seems more saturated.
Should I be investing in a better quality CPL?
BTW the Camera was Pentax MX of course, film was Reala 100 (expired 2007), shot at 64. I've been shooting it at 80, and getting rather delicate, pastel colour, as in my pictures from the Greenwich Meet. Shooting at 64, even if it's only a third of a stop faster, seems to give a more saturated look anyway, even without the CPL. Is that what I should expect?
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