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Neutral Density Filters Advice

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  • #22
Stacey Spears said:
I have the Formatt Hot Mirror / ND filters. They were $135 ea for 77mm.
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Literally ordered two of those today Stacey. I will be purchasing the Schneider Platinum IRNDs around March/April for use on a feature, but I'll need something better than my normal NDs for the next few months as they have way too much IR contamination.
 
Phil Holland said:
Literally ordered two of those today Stacey. I will be purchasing the Schneider Platinum IRNDs around March/April for use on a feature, but I'll need something better than my normal NDs for the next few months as they have way too much IR contamination.
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Would you recommend these to begin? I'll be using them for narrative work. Should I got with .6 and .9 or .6 and 1.2?

Thanks!
 
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  • #24
William Graydon said:
Would you recommend these to begin? I'll be using them for narrative work. Should I got with .6 and .9 or .6 and 1.2?

Thanks!
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Tough question and one I'm still answering myself. I'll likely be testing out a ton of these, but based on the previous tests the Schneider Platinum IRND seem to be the best choice if you are concerned about quality. However, I can't buy those today as the 77mm filters aren't even being manufactured until the end of the 1st quarter of 2012. Hard to wait that long in my case.

I'll be testing out the Formatt filters once my Scarlet arrives and I'll share the results. I picked up a 0.9 (3 stop) and a 1.8 (6 stop). The main reason for just those two is to see how they hold up at stronger filtration levels. In my experience many ND solutions really go screwy past 1.2.

Filter selection and range is a personal choice. I know I can solve many 1 to 2 stop variations in camera, with set lighting, or in post based on my experience, hence the .9. The 1.8 I choose is to attempt wide aperture work in natural light and on set.

If I fall in love with these, I'll probably buy the full range though.

The reason I'm going with 77mm rounds is out of my now 43 still lenses only two of those have larger than 77mm filter threads. I like to stay compact and I enjoy shooting without a matte box a lot. However, when using rental cinema glass I'll be renting a matte box and filters to accommodate their larger diameters.

Also, I have aerial shoots lined up this year and spring next year and there's no chance in hell I'll be playing around with matte boxes and filter trays when the helicopter's door is open. Otherwise somebody walking around Los Angeles could end up with a glass filter stuck in their head.
 
Phil Holland said:
Tough question and one I'm still answering myself. I'll likely be testing out a ton of these, but based on the previous tests the Schneider Platinum IRND seem to be the best choice if you are concerned about quality. However, I can't buy those today as the 77mm filters aren't even being manufactured until the end of the 1st quarter of 2012. Hard to wait that long in my case.

I'll be testing out the Formatt filters once my Scarlet arrives and I'll share the results. I picked up a 0.9 (3 stop) and a 1.8 (6 stop). The main reason for just those two is to see how they hold up at stronger filtration levels. In my experience many ND solutions really go screwy past 1.2.

Filter selection and range is a personal choice. I know I can solve many 1 to 2 stop variations in camera, with set lighting, or in post based on my experience, hence the .9. The 1.8 I choose is to attempt wide aperture work in natural light and on set.

If I fall in love with these, I'll probably buy the full range though.

The reason I'm going with 77mm rounds is out of my now 43 still lenses only two of those have larger than 77mm filter threads. I like to stay compact and I enjoy shooting without a matte box a lot. However, when using rental cinema glass I'll be renting a matte box and filters to accommodate their larger diameters.

Also, I have aerial shoots lined up this year and spring next year and there's no chance in hell I'll be playing around with matte boxes and filter trays when the helicopter's door is open. Otherwise somebody walking around Los Angeles could end up with a glass filter stuck in their head.
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Thank you for your response Phil. Very insightful. If the platinum's are that good then I'll spend a little extra $ and buy them. They have the 4x4's on sale for $235 at film tools.
 
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  • #26
William Graydon said:
Thank you for your response Phil. Very insightful. If the platinum's are that good then I'll spend a little extra $ and buy them. They have the 4x4's on sale for $235 at film tools.
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Yep. They are out of stock at the moment. Schneider is looking to fulfill back order and stock by the end of January on 4x4s. Spoke to them this week. 77mm aren't even in production yet though. Spring 2012 for those.
 
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  • #27
Just a little update for those curious. I received two Formatt filters I ordered earlier this week. I purchased the .9 and 1.8 HMND. I don't have my Scarlet yet, but I will be shooting with these filters over the next couple weeks until the holiday. Initial impression optically is they are pretty decent. The 1.8 was the one I was really concerned about, but it is pretty decent.

I'll get some time on an Epic in a week and I'll know more about how these filters interact with the Red MX sensors. I'm currently optimistic though.

Advice. Do not stack these HMNDs. You get some real undesirable color fringing at wider apertures (f/2), which is to be expected I guess. I will be testing stacking my regular NDs on top of these though for slight adjustments. I don't like stacking NDs if I can avoid it.

More tests tomorrow and then shooting all day/night Sunday.
 
@Matthew I haven't tried white balancing in camera because it's raw and the shift shouldn't be too extreme ideally to handle in post (since I handle all the post anyway). This one is extreme.

I sent it in to Schneider and heard back fairly quickly that the filter I had was a pre-release test model and the release model doesn't have a strong cast... Not sure who screwed that up but it serves as a reminder to make sure you test what you're using before using it in production!

They're sending me a replacement.
 
Phil,

thanks again for all your insightful posts, they're REALLY helpful for those of us new to all of this! I'm wondering if there are any issues with using a screw-on circular polarizer (I have expensive ones already for my Canon lenses) combined with either the Formatt or Schneider Platinum IRND's in a mattebox. This would only be when I actually need to polarize, not just for added ND. I'm assuming this would work fine, correct? Just trying to avoid buying a 4X4 Polarizer if the screw-on's I already have will work just as well.

thanks!
 
Hey guys, just a confusion set in from probably over researching this, are IRND/Hot Mirrors recommended for Epic too? some of the research led me to think it's really only needed for the scarlet..
just looking for clarification
 
Liam Underwood said:
Hey guys, just a confusion set in from probably over researching this, are IRND/Hot Mirrors recommended for Epic too? some of the research led me to think it's really only needed for the scarlet..
just looking for clarification
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Same MX sensor on both same needs, dragon sensor does not need it.
 
Just a work of advice.

Any IRND filter should be tested with the camera you intend to use it with. Not all cameras have the same filtration in their OLPF and thus not every brand of IRND filters the same wavelength of light.

Each IRND should be tested with the specific camera/sensor combination.

Battistella
 
I'd say that filter selection is in fact (at most times) a very personal choice... If I were asked for a filter-buying-suggestion, when it comes to ND's, I'd highly recommend the Format-Hitech Firecrest ND's .3 - 3.0...

by the way... anyone got an idea where to get hard cases for 4x5.65 and 6.6x6.6 filters...???
 
David Battistella said:
Just a work of advice.

Any IRND filter should be tested with the camera you intend to use it with. Not all cameras have the same filtration in their OLPF and thus not every brand of IRND filters the same wavelength of light.

Each IRND should be tested with the specific camera/sensor combination.

Battistella
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I agree with this.
 
Color shifts are fixable. What isn't fixable is the horrifying ghosts that some ND filters have been shown to impart when using certain lenses. This was a serious, serious problem with our first film and the use of Pancro mirror NDs. There was a very subtle, but clearly visible ghost on these shots, and many other people using DSLR lenses found the same thing. Worse, the effect was pretty subtle on set, and in the heat of the moment, no one saw it. BUT, once we got into post, there it was. . . a ghosted shift of about a foot or two in real-space. You may not have a ghost using cinema lenses, but we found that Formatt IR+ND filters NEVER caused a problem with ghosting, even in the worst conditions.


Stephen
 
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  • #38
Stephen Pruitt said:
Color shifts are fixable. What isn't fixable is the horrifying ghosts that some ND filters have been shown to impart when using certain lenses. This was a serious, serious problem with our first film and the use of Pancro mirror NDs. There was a very subtle, but clearly visible ghost on these shots, and many other people using DSLR lenses found the same thing. Worse, the effect was pretty subtle on set, and in the heat of the moment, no one saw it. BUT, once we got into post, there it was. . . a ghosted shift of about a foot or two in real-space. You may not have a ghost using cinema lenses, but we found that Formatt IR+ND filters NEVER caused a problem with ghosting, even in the worst conditions.
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Agreed. For the most part.

Ghosting sucks real hard. With Hot Mirror Combo Filters you must be super cautious, especially on wider lenses like 25mm and wider. It's also to me super critical to be cautious when stacking filters and also stacking order in some situations. When truly finishing for a 4K finish tiny optical oddities reveal themselves a bit more and there's not many places to hide.

As for general color shift, if the shift itself is something that can be fixed via white balancing or a minimal color correction "life is good". However, I've seen more than one bloke out there shoot around ND 1.2-1.8 without IR protection on Mysterium-X with skin tones exposed and once you start correcting that magenta cast you'll clearly see what's lost in that equation. Which is why it's super important in my mind to use IR protection on Mysterium-X from around 0.9/1.2 ND and above. For many, including myself, I shot 0.3 and up with IR protection. Initially Formatt Hot Mirror/ND Combo Filters, then Schneider IRNDs, then Tiffen Hot Mirror/IRNDs. After that I moved to Dragon and I'm using good old NDs and more recently the Formatt-Hitech Firecrests. For the first time in a long time (since shooting film) I can say with Dragon I'm very happy with ND filtration again. Life is good on this front now. Though I will say outside of the Firecrest Filters, it's a SOB trying to get filters in the 0.3-2.7 ND range that are reasonably matched. Luckily I don't really even have to deal with that anymore.
 
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  • #40
Robert Cook said:
Phil,
I was looking at these at B&H

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/764280-REG/Tiffen_W4565PROKT_The_Pro_HV_Filter.html

Are they any good for good old ND? Purchased the Dragon upgrade so not IR....Yea!.

Thanks
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For Dragon they will be just fine. I have a set of those somewhere.


Heh. Funny to think that this thread is 3 years old now. When I started this thread I was seeking advice in regards to Mysterium-X and ND performance. I had no idea at the time I was going to go on an insane mission to test nearly ever ND, IRND, Hot Mirror/Combo Filter out there. Fun to look back at that now.

With Dragon regular NDs work just fine. I have Tiffen, Schneider, and Formatt-Hitech stuff here as well as various other odd brands ranging from cheap to dirt cheap. I'm using Format-Hitech Firecrests now for all of my shooting because they are the most consistent in terms of color neutrality and measured density. Got a full set of Schneider regular NDs here that I spent a great deal of time color matching and those still get used here and there. Might have to whip out those Tiffens, I think they've been in a drawer for a while. I sold off my Tiffen IRND/Hot Mirror combo filters that I used on Mysterium-X because I've moved to Dragon. I think I have a couple Formatt ND/Hot Mirror Combo screw ins laying around. Still have a modest set of Schneider IRNDs laying around too.

Utter madness. Just glad I don't have to worry about the chaos that IR contamination brought to the equation. Dragon's been an utter joy on that front.
 
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