Which ND?

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Neil
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I am looking for a ND filter for my 17-55mm canon. I am looking at being able to shoot waterfalls and make use of the 2.8 in bright conditions is it best to get the 10 stop or will a 4 stop be adequate?
 
I'd say get both. In bright light 9-10 stop filter would be required for these effects. I have Hoya ND400 HMC 9-stop and rate it highly. It has more neutral colour compared with B+W.
For late evening / early morning or more subtle effects 10 stop is an overkill. It makes it very hard to compose and exposures are into a few minutes. 3 stop is (ND8) is probably better under those circumstances. CPL can knock off 1-2 stop quite easily, and 2 of them can create interesting effects.
 
Out of curiosity, why would you want to get the long exposure effect at whilst shooting at f/2.8? It would make more sense to shoot at a smaller aperture like f/8. On the other hand, rather than using a ND I'd recommend using a CPL as it will also help cut through the reflections in the waterfall.
 
Bendihossan said:
Out of curiosity, why would you want to get the long exposure effect at whilst shooting at f/2.8? It would make more sense to shoot at a smaller aperture like f/8. On the other hand, rather than using a ND I'd recommend using a CPL as it will also help cut through the reflections in the waterfall.
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I wanted to keep the DOF that you get from f/2.8 I assumed this would be maintained even with the longer exposure you can get from the ND filter.
 
The shutter speed you want, and therefore the strength of the ND filter, depends on the speed of movement. And of course the level of ambient light affects everything.

Waterfalls move quite quickly, so you'll get the milky look at around 1/4sec, so four stops ND is handy. If it's smoothed out waves or streaky clouds effects, then ten seconds or more and a ten stopper. Like Daugirdas, I use both.

I'm not really understanding the f/2.8 DoF thing, given that waterfalls will tend to be shot at distance when there'll be lots of DoF anyway even at f/2.8.
 
well for working in daylight with flash apertures can get big, so an nd8 can make them more usable while retaining AF, which goes to pot at 10 stops
 
what you want is the 10 stop for landscape/seascape shots and an ND4 for 2.8 portraits in bright sunshine where you want to keep the shallow DOF. Although i would think unless its really sunny then the shutter speed would take care of that for you without the ND4.

unless you want long exposure with shallow DOF? which to be honest sounds like a bit of a science experiment!
 
As much as I would love to get an ND110, I have found a set of ND's (0.3/0.6/0.9 possibly stacked) will allow the flexibility to get the shutter speeds to your liking for different lighting conditions but I also know I need to go to say f18 to sometimes get the longer shutter speeds. So, from memory, on a really bright day, if you specifically wanted f2.8 then an ND110 may be the only answer.
 
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