Filters - Circular Polarizing

[Nicola.P]

I have been looking at circular polarizing filters and is there a difference between normal ones and those specified as digital? There seems to be a huge jump in price.
Can a normal one work on a digital camera?

[dcash29]

Yes buy a normal one

[Eau Rouge]

Buy one that's part of a filter system, that way you only have to buy the one, and it can work on all your lenses.

There are such things as Linear Polarisers that are cheaper than Circular Polarisers. The Linear ones will prevent TTL metering or autofocus. Make sure the "cheaper" ones you are seeing aren't them.

[Nicola.P]

They are both circular. These are the links.

This is the one I refered to as normal: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hoya-0554-52-PL-Cir/dp/B00006HOAN/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1212947775&sr=8-8

Then there is this one which is detailed as digital: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hoya-52mm-Digital-Circular-Filter/dp/B000KL7JF8/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1212947775&sr=8-7

On this site the difference is only around £10 but on another site the difference was around £50!!
What is a filter system?

[Eau Rouge]

A Filter system is a filter holder and adapter rings. It's what you use to hold things like ND Grad filters in front of the lens, and you can buy a big circular polariser for any given filter system.
You buy the holder, adapters for your lenses, and the CP, and you can then use that same CP on all your lenses, rather than buying one for each lens size.

[towershot]

Try punching cokin P series into the search , it will show you, but as said ,buy a big filter to cover any future big lenses.:thumbs:

[Nicola.P]

Ok thanks will have a look.

Also what benefits does a neutral density filter have? I see they have different numbers (0.9, 0.6 etc) what do these mean?

[sprog]

ND filters allow you to shoot with a larger aperture or slower shutter speed than would normally be the case. Especially useful in very bright daylight where you want a shallow DoF or to add movement to a shot.

I recently bought a Calumet 77mm SMC (HOYA Pro) circular polarising filter off Amazon for the cheaper MC price thanks to an Amazon listing cock-up and Calumet honoured it, well done chaps! (sorry they've fixed it now) It's very good BTW, especially on wide ange, even down to 10mm, hardly any vignetting.

[Nicola.P]

Ok thanks. I have discovered a hidden 2nd hand camera sho near work that sell filters that normally sell for £15 for only £3 perfect condition too. Will have a nose in there tomorrow.
Any other type of filters people would recommend that I should keep my eye out for.

[Eau Rouge]

Graduated Neutral Density ones. They have a clear bottom half and a dark upper half.

The idea is that you position the dark bit over the sky (say) and it reduces it's brightness to be the same as the foreground, therefore giving you the same exposure setting for the whole frame when in reality the sky is a stop or two brighter.

0.3 is a reduction of 1 stop of light (ISO200 to ISO100, or f2.8 to f4 or 1/500 to 1/250th shutter speed)
0.6 is, naturally, 2 stops

[Nicola.P]

Graduated Neutral Density ones. They have a clear bottom half and a dark upper half.

The idea is that you position the dark bit over the sky (say) and it reduces it's brightness to be the same as the foreground, therefore giving you the same exposure setting for the whole frame when in reality the sky is a stop or two brighter.

0.3 is a reduction of 1 stop of light (ISO200 to ISO100, or f2.8 to f4 or 1/500 to 1/250th shutter speed)
0.6 is, naturally, 2 stops

Thanks. I wondered what those little numbers mean :)