All i want for Christmas is you! (heliopan)

[Christina Ava]

ι think i found one on eBay for 135 euros!

[Cinegain]

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure the image in the first post of the thread was photoshopped: just a circular selection around the filter and then blur everything around it.

It's not as if the filter will suddenly give you supercrisp footage because it's somekind of special 'digital filter'.

So, there's nothing wrong with putting filters in front of your lens... as long as you really have a use for it.

 

Like you say, you need that variable ND filter, because else using your desired settings the image would be blown out completely.

If you need to make quick adjustments, can't be bothered with stacking ND's and don't mind the quirks of a variable ND, then there's nothing wrong with that either. As said before, you really need that to save a shot. But not using an UV filter doesn't leave you with a 'broken image' that needs 'fixing in post'.

 

I'm just not sure if a 300 dollar UV Digital filter by some fancy brand will get you 300 dollars worth of improvement.

If you don't use one, probably your footage is hardly any difference. But of course, it does depend on where you live and how you shoot stuff and what you're shooting in the first place. If you live in the mountains and like to hike around in bright sunlight, it might actually of very slight use. But I'd consider its benefits pretty minimal. If you're determined and insist you do need one, then it's less a matter of 'do I need an UV filter?' and more of a 'does a 300 dollar filter give me 10x the value of a 30 dollar filter?. I think you can spend the money more wisely. But you know what... stuff wouldn't exist if there wasn't anyone to buy it. Heck, I don't know how they do it, but Hasselblad is going to sell a rebranded Sony RX100M2 for crazy $$$. Apparently there's people buying that too. But getting something just 'because it exists and costs a lot so it must be good', I'm not really sure that's a good reason to get it. If anything you just get unwanted ghosting/flares and using it together with a vND as you say, it would increase risk of vignetting and stacking glass, if not absolutely neccessary will almost surely degrade performance.

[Christina Ava]

i also found the  (in)famous black dot filters here!  made famous by their use in "southern comfort" by legendary dp  andrew laszlo !

do want...

[Guest Ebrahim Saadawi]

Since you guys brought this up, I live in the sunniest spot on earth, the middle east on the equator, with no clouds even at january, the sun is dead serious and burning, and Tempreture here now is 50 degrees C (or 122 F),

So what do these factors affect in my image quality? How do these IR and UV rays actually manifest themselves practically in my image under the sun or indoors? I've never had any weird image charachteristic under sun light, just the normal optical flaws that are related to other factors. Perhaps I don't like the filter idea just because I don't even know what it will eliminate!

[Bioskop.Inc]

No one has mentioned it yet, but there is a simple test to find out if you need one.

Film something Black (piece of clothing, card etc...) on a bright sunny day (i.e. the circumstances where UV/IR will be a problem) and if it doesn't come out black but a muddy brown, or whatever colour shift, then you need a UV/IR cut filter.

[Julian]

@ andy and the guys that oppose the filters
i can see how the uv/ir is useless to most of you, especially friends from the UK

the overcast skies offer that protection and its not needed, there is no better filter than the clouds

the light where i am living is very different, with the exception of 3 winter months, i cant leave my house without my tiffen vND
everything gets burned here below f4 for most of the day.
summer is a nightmare...from 13:00-16:00 the UV is off the charts

if you have the time check this interview from NAB for tiffen, icheck at 08:36 the "ill fix it all in post"

[dahlfors]

This Heliopan 77mm Digital Glass Filter has been specially designed for digital cameras. It blocks ultra-violet radiation as well as IR rays. The result is improved color separation and reproduction with digital cameras. It is a necessity with artificial light for best digital results.

Can you show an example where an UV filter actually makes a visible difference?

 

It's a long time (10+ years ago) since Heliopan introduced this filter. Back then, there were quite a few digital cameras that picked up infrared light and didn't have proper filters.

 

Things have improved over time, and today sensors filter out infrared light very well. Photographers who are into infrared photography stay away from the newer digital cameras and instead go for the older ones where the IR filter is a detachable filter placed just above the sensor that can fairly easily be removed manually.

 

I've seen tests where using a UV filter supposedly turned the image a slight tiny amount more yellow than blue - such slight that it could have been a minuscule difference in white balance. In my own shots on Nikon D200 and D800 I have not been able to see any difference with UV or not, and I've had a few different brands of UV filters (Note: D200 is a CCD sensor camera, D800 is a CMOS sensor for comparison). So, not enough to convince me to use a UV filter for any other reason than for protection in rough environments.

 

So unless you have a lot of extra money or shoot film or on a DSLR that is about 10 years old, I don't see a reason to get this filter.

[dahlfors]

But on the other hand Christina, take a look at this thread: '?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>

 

That's one of the things I'd like for xmas :) Seems like it would be possible to get a nice look in harsh light with those filters.