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MY VARI ND filters suck thread


zerocool22
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Hi guys,

Lately I have been fed up with my Vari ND screw on filters. Mainly because whenever I shoot towards a light source (sun/light/etc..) I see a immense degrading of the contrast, colors fade, softens the image, almost a light leaky effect, which kinda ruins shots. I have a bunch of them of different brands. Allthough all of them are old.

Not sure if the newest VARI ND filters still have this issue? And have not compared to incamera ND filters, to see if they face the same issue. 

Any recommendations?

Thanks!

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Great idea. I’m currently using the K&F Concept ND8-128. Pros of this one I think are the hard stops at beginning and end so you’re not circling to find the beginning/end of filter. Also no x pattern or at least reduced from my footage. Cons- colors do suffer from a magenta bias at times, easily corrected in post from the casual shooting I do. I have three filter threads for my Fuji lenses that I adapt up to a 82 however I would like to upgrade to a magnetic system as the filter adapters always wind up getting stuck on my lens.

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Just like with anything else, you get what you pay for. A $300 Heliopan variable ND is going to have better performance characteristics than a $69 no-name filter.

Even expensive variable ND filters aren’t going to perform as well as non-variable ND filters and non-variable NDs aren’t going to perform as well as no filter at all. 

I have a Heliopan variable ND and it works well, but I only use it when I’m in a hurry, which isn’t very often. Otherwise I stick with non-variable NDs. I have both Heliopan and B+W NDs and I consider their performance to be top notch, but any additional air/glass surfaces are going to have some impact on image quality.

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Semi-recently a certain cat-lover on YT who shall-not-be-named did a video talking about variable ND filters, the different types, and the different issues that vNDs can have.  I was surprised at how complex the situation is and how many things can go wrong when using them.

In the tests he showed, which included a range of vNDs, performance didn't seem to correlate much with price, but that might also have been intentional as I think he was launching his own line and therefore had a vested interest in not showing any good ones that are out there.

The take-aways that I got were:

  • there's lots happening in there, even from a single vND changing when you turn it
  • lots of things can go wrong, depending on the type used and how they're used
  • better to use fixed NDs or simply to accept the errors and fix what you can in post
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20 hours ago, zerocool22 said:



Not sure if the newest VARI ND filters still have this issue? And have not compared to incamera ND filters, to see if they face the same issue. 
 

Canon in camera NDs for example are not VNDs but are normal NDs so you don't have these issues. On the opposite Canon EF-RF ND adapter is an VND filter, and you have all these issues.

The more range the VND have the more problem at the extreme they bring. In my experience, and I have a few of them, the price does not really make a huge difference. If you want the maximum quality normal NDs is the way to go but of course less practical but changing the ISO impact less the image quality that VND..... 

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Most issues come from the fact that VND is not ND. Which should be obvious: 2xPola is anything but ND, except someone with an inclination for marketing thought it clever to call 2xPola "Variable ND".

Pola filters are special purpose filters and it makes no sense to use them for general purpose light levels reduction. There are too many variables involved in filtering polarized light, starting with light falling angles and reflective surface characteristics, for this to be a reliable levels reducing method. Not to mention the adverse side effects of filtering out some reflected light more than other, e.g. preferentially filtering out skin subsurface scattered light otherwise known as "skin glow".

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Some tough love.

They will always suck.  There is no such thing as a good one.  The way they work is by degrading your image. The sooner you accept it the better.  
 

I long ago went to straight or internal ND. Do I occasionally use VND? Yeah.  But I can count on one hand the number of times in a year.

I suspect you need to hear this because you wrote a post about it.  Not everyone will agree but throw away the crutch and never look back

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