Filters for HD

[Wes Shinn]

Anyone know of a good filter set for landscape/night/day use? Other than the basic polarizer or star filter or ND filters.....?

[Phil Rhodes]

Hi,

 

Wouldn't that depend entirely on the production and the results you wanted?

 

Very light black promists are often used, as they're perceived to take the "video edge" off the image. I get the impression that this is actually a reaction to over-enhanced video images in both SD and HD, and with modern cameras having the option to turn off sharpening or detail enhancement, it's not something I'd automatically do unless I specifically wanted that look.

 

It's possible that low-con or ultracon filters can mitigate dynamic range issues slightly, although they all have a look of their own too.

 

Otherwise, I guess you do what video cameramen have been doing for years, which is to grad down areas of the frame that are overexposed and shoot for the results you want!

 

Phil

[Tim J Durham]

Hi,

 

Wouldn't that depend entirely on the production and the results you wanted?

 

Very light black promists are often used, as they're perceived to take the "video edge" off the image. I get the impression that this is actually a reaction to over-enhanced video images in both SD and HD, and with modern cameras having the option to turn off sharpening or detail enhancement, it's not something I'd automatically do unless I specifically wanted that look.

 

It's possible that low-con or ultracon filters can mitigate dynamic range issues slightly, although they all have a look of their own too.

 

Otherwise, I guess you do what video cameramen have been doing for years, which is to grad down areas of the frame that are overexposed and shoot for the results you want!

 

Phil

 

I regularly use black pro-mist filters in addition to dialing down the sharpening. Ultra-cons are less useful as they essentially do the same thing as the black stretch function although the filters add no noise. I have not experienced any significant noise problems using black stretch so that's $$ saved. I use grads regularly and every once in a while I'll use a coral, straw or tobacco. But not strong and not often.

 

It's somewhat comical that Sony (Panasonic too?) includes a star filter as one of the four choices on their internal filter wheels. How many times would you actually get to shoot the Emmy's (the only show I can think of that uses them) and if you DID, you'd be using studio cams, not field cams, so why not put something more useful? That's valuable real estate. I'd rather have another ND filter, for instance.

[Brian Drysdale]

Grads are extremely useful, I've got sets of both soft and hard edged ND filters.