Lenses And Filters

True, which is why I did warn about what they are really designed for! and just how dark is the ND filter you were using?

As an eg re 60163, you can see just how harsh the light was just by looking at the coaching stock, and as I said an ND filter will enrich colours, and I quite like the result - the sky has definition, the loco has become the focal point and the greenery makes the background and the foreground is balanced! - without the ND filter the result wouldn't have been as good! and ND2 is dark enough for me.



But as Lewis has just said, used in the right environment, ie time.place setting etc can be very effective!

Lets face it, photography is all about experimenting, trying different filters, camera setting etc - photographing mainline steam doing 75+ is a different ball game where you get one or two shots and have to decide before hand what you want to do, where as photographing heritage steam trundling up and down gives you a lot more time and chance to experiment to get the effect you were looking for or happen upon by chance, and you don't really know the result until you processed it!

 

I regularly use a medium ND grad filter as I can't stand blown skies and if you're shooting from a low view point then I think they're invaluable.
Article HERE if you're interested.
Also if you're splashing a few hundred quid on a lens then stick a UV filter on the front for protection, you might want to sell it some time in the future and nobody wants to buy a scratched lens!

 

Wise words indeed!

 

Taken 20 minutes earlier than Duty Druid's without any filtration. Shot on a Canon 5D3 in RAW with a little post processing in PS Elements 10.

60163-FPK by KING COBRA 92, on Flickr

 

Understand their value in a static situation such as landscape photography, but find it more difficult to envisage using them in a dynamic situation like moving steam trains.

 

If you had used one HERE the exposure would have been better balanced and the sky wouldn't have "blown out".

Try one and see.

 

Oh, and one quick word of warning if using grad filters, be careful where you use them. One photographer uses them religiously, and in some of the books he's had published, signals next to the loco appear white at the bottom, but grey at the top!

 

Stupid phone posted it twice!

 

Here's a thought, I wonder what that shot would have looked like if you had used a polarising filter.

 

Exactly, Swiss Toni is thinking similar to what I have.

I appreciate the comments of 'Don't use filters', or even the usual 'Use UV filters as protection' ( this I have been doing, the 50mm is a new buy and yet to order a filter for ). And Neil has some good advice with buying a later copy of Adobe Lightroom, as currently I'm on one of the oldest Photoshop Elements imaginable but it's what my laptop seems to run with little fuss. Thanks for all the inputs so far.

The main focus was though, who has used these differing filters such as Polarizing or ND graduated? Photography is a wonderful thing to experiment with, but it's good to get a heads up and see what's advisable, what's not, and what's just naff?

Perhaps this thread should be used however, as one of those 'What equipment' topics where it can be useful and interesting to share insights to what we use, and what we'd like to use based on other people's person verdicts?

 

Every Canon that I have owned, from the early 10D to my current 1DX, has shown the image when in RAW or JPEG. Nowadays, I only shoot RAW unless I know that I am going to be emailing some quickie shots and then I shoot both.

The only Nikon DSLR's that I have owned were used in JPEG so it's a surprise to me that you can't see a RAW image.

ND filters have been essential with my HDV video shooting in hot climates but it's a very rare day in the UK when I have added one here to a DSLR. Still wondering about uses for an ND10! Polarizers are great for holiday shoots near or on water but a waste of time for railway stuff.

 

Those highlights could easily be recovered in Lightroom 4.

 

Polarizers do more than just reduce reflections from water and glass they also add vividness and contrast to landscapes and skies if used correctly.
As lots of railway photographers prefer the train in the landscape style then certainly not a waste of time.

Yes Neil, but the thread is titled "Lenses and filters"

 

+1 for a UV (or 1A "skylight" - does anyone still use them?) screw-on filter as a scratch-guard. This is perhaps even more important on a fixed-lens camera (such as most video camcorders) since you might have to replace the whole camera to get rid of a scratch.

Graduated filters of any shade need to be the square kind mounted in a separate holder, so you can adjust them up or down to match your horizon. It may seem counter-intuitive, but graduated ND filters are perhaps more useful in dull conditions than bright-and-sunny. Certainly for video, where you are often using auto-exposure (not enough hands to ride exposure, focus, pan, zoom and audio all at once!), there is a tendency for the foreground to be under exposed on a cloudy day. Darkening the sky slightly with an ND Grad can give better results than using AE-shift. Yes, you can probably fix it in post, but my experience is that the fewer effects you have to render, the better the final image quality will be.

A (set of) full ND filter(s), not graduated, could be very useful for a cheaper video camera. It's very important to keep shutter speed to 1/50th (unless you are after a special effect) and with the very small detector chips used in most cameras, the usable apperture-range is also quite limited. Difraction effects can start to set in at f5.6. Sometimes, video cameras have a form of auto-ND built-in, but being able to control ND yourself may give better results in bright light. The more "serious" video cameras have 2 or 3 sets of ND filters built in, controlled by a switch behind the lens

I've had a polarising filter for my still camera (I'm still taking colour transparencies with a Nikon FM) for many years and use it every now and then. Great for sunny landscapes with dark blue skies and white puffy clouds, with or without a steam train.

Things to beware of (aka "mistakes I have made"): lenses where the front element turns when you adjust focus or zoom, so your filter-holder turns too; filter holders that mask auto-focus sensors (can you switch to internal auto-focus only?); filter holder hoods that cast incomplete shadows...

 

I've not yet been brave enough to try an ND grad, yet!

I'm still experimenting with the standard filter.........................................................

 

Surprisingly I can read, less surprising is that you haven't understood the point I'm making. It's obviously gone over your head.

 

Even if the picture had been sufficiently technically perfect to satisfy the photographic technique anoraks, it would never have been a "Master Shot", given the mismatch of locomotive and stock and the presence of the O8 Diesel Shunter.

However, it is a record of that train at that location at that time on that day - which is all it purports to be.

 

How patronising

 

Yes Toni and thus it's on topic to suggest an alternative to filters and that's what Neil has done.

 

Not so good in my opinion.