Filter Advice?

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dancook

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Dan
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Hello!

I'm going to Switzerland in July, there will be lots of landscape opportunities and also walks up the mountains with waterfalls etc..

I'm considering it might be time to buy some filters, so I can capture these scenes as well as I might try.

Quality is always high on my list, so I'm happy to invest in Lee/HiTech - although my start up budget is about £170.

I do have a concern, that since I will need to take my tripod and it might be a bit heavy to put in with my hold luggage - so my entire plan may be flawed from the get go.

I'll be using a 35mm lens on a FF body (72mm thread), so it's not super wide - but that'll come one day.

Has anyone got suggestions for suitable filters to tackle these requirements?

Cheers, Dan
 
Lee filters are the best, but unless it is really bright they are best used with a tripod, but that will be the same for any brand of filters.

A CPL filter may help with bluer skies/reflections and should still be handhold able, but it really depends on what effects you want from the filter.
 
I do have a screw on B+W CPL filter.

I was generally thinking about trying to make sure the sky and ground were exposed correctly.

Many landscapes/waterfall photos taken with long exposures to give smoothed water/clouds can create such beautiful photos - I thought it might be a good opportunity to try to create these kind of photos.

I checked my tripod and head should be 3kg and fit in my suitcase, so I'll probably be ok with it in the hold.
 
Polariser and HD grads a must - all that snow and blue sky :D

Not that Im jealous in any way :bang:

Les :LOL::LOL:
 
Lez325 said:
Polariser and HD grads a must - all that snow and blue sky :D

Not that Im jealous in any way :bang:

Les :LOL::LOL:
Click to expand...

I guess you mean ND Grad? not heard of of HD and Amazon don't have results for that.

Do I use both at the same time, put the CPL on - then the filter holder on that?

Do I want a couple of grads or should I look at a grad+(whatever the term is for solid filter). Since if it's a waterfall, there might not be a sky in the photo.
 
I did similar last year in Austria - I already had some Lee filters (ND Grads + Big Stopper), and ended up buying a lightweight Manfrotto travel tripod that would go in my case - worked fine for my 7D + 10-22 + filters. Also used a Hoya CPL for some of the lakes and sky shots, which was well worthwhile getting.
 
To get started i would buy, Lee foundation filter holder, lee 72mm filter holder ring, (wide-angle ring best), Hitech 0.6 Hard Grad, Hitech 0.9 ND Neutral density filter, Hoya or B+W circular polariser. And ofc a lightweight tripod.
 
With only a month to go you should be wary of messing shots up with 'new' filters.
Polarisers can do good things but also screw colours up - there's a learning curve and while out there with quite brief opportunities I'm not sure you want to be fiddling about with filter on filter off, 3 times as many shots to be sure...
The ND Grads are not a bad idea but even a cheap set of ebay would be OK for occasional use.
Yes they are worth having but are you really having problems that need 'fixing' without them?
 
I think that the number one thing on the 'need' list would be a polariser. Since you already have a screw in one, the next question would be whether or not that would work with a filter holder attached to the front of it. I've heard conflicting views on this so it's worth doing some reading. Either way it wouldn't be ideal as you would need to realign the filter holder each time you adjust the polariser (assuming you'd be using grads as well).

So if you do decide to go for a filter kit for the whole lot, you'll probably need to factor in a 105mm circular polariser to fit on the front. Unfortunately I don't think there are any budget options for this. On a fairly tight budget myself, I went for the hitech 105mm CPL which I think comes in about the £100 mark. Wouldn't leave a great deal of budget left over I'm afraid as I'd imagine another £100 could be swallowed by purchasing a Lee foundation kit, a 105mm front adaptor and a 72mm lens adaptor (standard will be fine on a 35mm lens). Then you'll probably want something like a 0.9 soft grad. Hitech 150mm x 100mm one work well.

Expensive business unfortunately but you could get away with just your CPL and bracket your shots to recover any blown detail later.
 
I may have to hold off buying filters for this trip, I've been reminded that I'll need hiking boots...

But yes my CPL and bracket shots sound like the best option - and I've realised I've only my 16gb CF card.. and i'll probably need to buy another...

Sigh..where does all the money go.

This is where I'll be :) note the blown highlights in the clouds :bonk:

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=St...=7KzpACS-uR0LOEqDR_KH_A&cbp=12,173.21,,0,3.43

I appreciate the suggestions though, I'll definitely want filters at some point - maybe this trip isn't going to be the one. It probably won't be my last visit to this location anyway.
 
If money is tight, you could just buy a square graduated filter and hold it over the lens yourself. I believe it's fairly common practice amongst landscape photographers when shutter speeds are fairly high.
 
gad-westy said:
If money is tight, you could just buy a square graduated filter and hold it over the lens yourself. I believe it's fairly common practice amongst landscape photographers when shutter speeds are fairly high.
Click to expand...

thanks for the idea, I might consider it - see what I've got left after some boots and another CF card
 
gad-westy said:
If money is tight, you could just buy a square graduated filter and hold it over the lens yourself. I believe it's fairly common practice amongst landscape photographers when shutter speeds are fairly high.
Click to expand...

I occasionally do this when shutter speeds are very long and I want to add a little extra filtration to a shot but not across the full image, just hold it in front and move it about.
 
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