CPL and grads together.....

pastyman

pastyman

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Darrin
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How often do you use a cpl and grads together?

I have the Lee holder and a big Stopper plus some lesser nd's, but caught between getting a round cpl or square.
The round would be useful to pop on when just shooting on a bright day in gardens, scenery shots etc, with less gubbins on the lens, but can't then be used with the holder and grads.... But how often do you use a cpl with grads, or should I be thinking square all the way to be able to use nd's in conjunction with the cpl...?

Your thoughts and wisdom would be appreciated...
 
pastyman said:
How often do you use a cpl and grads together?

I have the Lee holder and a big Stopper plus some lesser nd's, but caught between getting a round cpl or square.
The round would be useful to pop on when just shooting on a bright day in gardens, scenery shots etc, with less gubbins on the lens, but can't then be used with the holder and grads.... But how often do you use a cpl with grads, or should I be thinking square all the way to be able to use nd's in conjunction with the cpl...?

Your thoughts and wisdom would be appreciated...
Click to expand...
50/50 for me. I have the Firecrest system though that allows use of the CPL without the main filter holder which is handy. Also, I have two of the adapters one with the CPL fitted and one without, this way I can have CPL only, ND filters only or ND filters and CPL filters, all with as little faff as possible.

I know there are some that think you can reproduce the effect of a CPL in post (barring reflections) but I still don't think it's quite the same personally. If it wasn't for the risk on uneven skies I'd use the CPL for every landscape I think.
 
I'm a big advocate for polarisers and I often use a ND grad with one. I screw the polariser on to the lens and hold the Grad against it manually. This is easier enough with a tripod but also possible handheld with some care. In certain situations a holder would be easier but the faff involved in using one in all situations puts me off. Just more bits and bobs to carry around!

I most often use a one-stop (hard) grad with the polariser to create beautiful and natural-looking blue skies with nice white clouds. Sometimes a two-stop can tone the clouds down so much that they look pale grey, which I definitely don't want! A stronger grad can be useful in some situations when you want to add drama to an already stormy looking sky, etc.

You can hide uneven polarisation in a partly cloudy sky but if that's not possible it is fairly easy to remove it in PP. Select the highly saturated area in LR using a 100% feather, and work on contrast and saturation. Not a problem!
 
I use a round CPL the majority of the time. 58mm for my CV40/1.2 & 67mm for my CV21/3.5 (via step up) & FE85. I do have a Hitech 85mm ali holder in 67mm thread with a few grads and a 95mm CPL for the front of that but I rarely use it in all honesty. I'd certainly recommend a round CPL only if only one was to be used.

It is nice to get it right in camera & see a perfectly exposed shot on the rear LCD. But it's also not much hassle to shoot two exposures for foreground/sky & blend in PP. No different to blending a 10 stop water/sea shot with a 'normal' fast shutter sky shot..... I have also been known to just hold a grad in front of the lens.

So, my opinion. Round CPL (y)
 
Do you think the new dehaze in Lightroom does a similar job to a cpl (barring reflections)?
 
pastyman said:
Do you think the new dehaze in Lightroom does a similar job to a cpl (barring reflections)?
Click to expand...
It can give "similar" results but not the same imo. Depending on the scene, light etc CPL's can give a depth to objects that is difficult to replicate in post imo.
 
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