Good enough polarizing filter

[QuietOne]

Iggy, I might love the lens, but the reality is that the Treasure Valley is high desert (average elevation of 2,500 feet). Summer sunlight is very harsh, and the airshow and river float seasons both start next month. I had a bright, sunny day yesterday, and tossed about half the pictures because of glare, and it's only May. Even in the shade, light or white colored objects might be difficult to rescue.

The attached photo has only had the midtones bumped slightly. No other adjustments, no compensation in the camera. You can see how hard the sky is, and the white of the cloud is starting to go.


So I'll put the lens on my birthday list and see if Mom is game. For the filters, the set might be a good idea. I'd been thinking I might need an ND filter once July rolled around, simply because I might not be able to cut the light enough without one.

Kawarthabob, I've stared through enough spotting scopes to be wary of going too cheap on optical glass. I'd rather get something that's a little more than my lens needs than something that's not quite enough.

[F8&Bthere]

I liked reading over the testing of polarizing filters done here, and found it very helpful:
Polarizing filters test - Introduction - Lenstip.com
If you scroll down you can see their testing of many of the popular, and some unpopular, brands and the results may surprise you.

From the results, I bought Marumi Super DHG cpol filters off ebay for between $30 and $80 (of course price varies by diameter). Before reading this article, I had never even heard of Marumi brand filters.

You shouldn't have to spend $150 to get a decent multicoated cpol filter.

If you prefer to stick to Hoya, I can recommend from experience the S-HMC as well as the Pro1D (if you need thin profile for wide angle) filters. And although the results in that lenstip filter test don't agree, there is a strong case made for Kenko filters being the same as Hoya, just different labels and Kenko are less expensive.

If you do prefer not to play on ebay, since you are in Idaho I would suggest checking out a very good company out of Montana that has quite reasonable prices called Spotlight Photo. They are an actual photography store (AFAIK), but also sell on ebay as well as mail order direct by phone or through their website:
Welcome to Spotlight Photo - The Last Best Place to Outfit Your Camera

It's long been my opinion to not buy filters from most local photography brick and mortar retail stores- they mark those kinds of accessories up horribly in most cases. I've bought 97% of my filters of all kinds online, mostly on ebay.

P.S. don't get too caught up in all the debating going on in forums...it gets crazy at times.

[Iguanasan]

Bambi recently bought some filters online somewhere. While there was a bit of a mixup in the order I think she ended up happy so maybe she might make a recommendation. I'll PM her to check into this thread and see what she might recommend. F8 is right though, you should not have to spend a fortune on a reasonable quality filter.

[Bambi]

Bambi recently bought some filters online somewhere. While there was a bit of a mixup in the order I think she ended up happy so maybe she might make a recommendation. I'll PM her to check into this thread and see what she might recommend. F8 is right though, you should not have to spend a fortune on a reasonable quality filter.

Iggy's right, I did. I had a gift card from Amazon last christmas and I used them to buy these filters (except for a 52mm camera). Amazon.com: Zeikos ZE-FLK58 58mm Multi-Coated 3 Piece Filter Kit (UV-CPL-FLD): Camera & Photo

there is a whole customer service story to go with this but I won't bore you with it except to say that I was quite satisfied with the outcome. I have used the UV and the Polarizer filter and have not noticed any distortions. The filters say that they are multi-coated and, given the price, are probably not great, but for my uses so far they work well and the cost was great.

[Marko]

If you want to save some cash you could by a larger polarizing filter for the largest lens you own, then buy step down rings for your other lenses.

I did a lot of that back in my student days.

[QuietOne]

Thank you all for your input. This gives me something I badly needed - a starting point. All I have to do now is find time to buy something. It's been busy.