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Seeking advice on Breakthrough Photography Circular Polarizer
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Aug 12, 2017 13:31:12   #
gwilliams6
 
B + W filters are the best. They make a very thin circular polarizer that is tops (nano coating and all ) . (A pro shooter of 40 years experience around the world).

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Aug 12, 2017 14:09:55   #
Rab-Eye Loc: Indiana
 
A phone call to 2filters.com could be worth your time. I've had great experiences dealing with them. I hope I have the URL right!

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Aug 12, 2017 14:54:35   #
gwilliams6
 
the B +W circular polarizer is also high transmission so you only lose one half to one stop of light. B + W is made by Schneider, a top quality legendary German Optical company.

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Aug 12, 2017 15:01:28   #
E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada
 
Check out SINGH RAY FILTERS. Extremely high quality and many innovative types of polarizing filters. Great optical engineering. Google them!

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Aug 12, 2017 22:58:32   #
boomer826 Loc: Florida gulf coast
 
E.L.. Shapiro wrote:
Check out SINGH RAY FILTERS. Extremely high quality and many innovative types of polarizing filters. Great optical engineering. Google them!


They are also very expensive.

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Aug 12, 2017 22:59:11   #
boomer826 Loc: Florida gulf coast
 
BREAKTHROUGH!

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Aug 13, 2017 12:24:13   #
cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD
 
Teton Viewer wrote:
Take a look at the Lenstip article that Jerry posted the link for above. Their testing is extensive and scientifically oriented. The top three in the ratings are Hoya, Marumi, and B+H, with B+H models making up four of the top 6. If you want the best be sure to purchase the top of the line model for whatever brand you choose. Because of the Lenstip ratings I've used the top of the line models for both Hoya and Marumi and they are excellent. I've not used B+H but their filters are widely and consistently praised. I think you will find these three brands will all perform very well.

Regarding Breakthough Photography, I know nothing about their products. I doubt they manufacture filters and wonder who they buy them from. I don't believe that $150 needs to be spent to get an excellent cpf and at the very least I would like to see some independent testing results before I spent that much.
Take a look at the Lenstip article that Jerry post... (show quote)



Jerry's links were interesting, but largely out of date, and the Breakthrough, which is relatively new, doesn't seem to have been considered in any of the links, so I'm not at all sure how to use them.

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Aug 14, 2017 10:39:33   #
E.L.. Shapiro Loc: Ottawa, Ontario Canada
 
Back in the film era- no so long ago, I must have had 500 filters in my studio. We needed them for color photography with both negative and transparency films for color correction and conversion, warming or cooling, shooting with fluorescent light and other light sources with discontinuous spectrums, polarizing filters and perhaps a few special effect filters like split NDs and whatever the manufactures could come up with and market. Black and white work required at least, a set of basic filters to control contrast, panchromatic renditions. sky and cloud effects and more. Then, of course. there were filters in various sizes, thread/slip on configurations, special thin filters for super wide lenses and a raft of adapter, step up/down and retaining rings- a regular hardware store of stuff!

Point is, having a comprehensive inventory of HIGH QUALITY filters and lens attachments required a sizable investment. Using cheap filters, for professional or commercial photography was and still is a big non-no! It is counterproductive, to say the least, to invest in fine quality lenses and precision cameras and then degrade the image quality with inferior filters by introducing a litany of distortions, optical aberrations, flare, and other impairments to the optical path of your camera system.

Nowadays, in the digital era, what with automatic and fully adjustable white balance plus and enormous corrective enablements in post production editing, there is no longer a need for color compensating or corrective filtration. If you are an aficionado of great black and white photography you may want to have a compliment of the basic, red, yellow, orange and green classic filters. Other that that, all you may require is a good polarizing filter, a UV or skylight filter for lens protection and perhaps a few ND or special effect filters.

If you only require a few filters, it is wise to invest in the very best that you can afford. When shopping and evaluating various brands filters there are a number of factors that you should know about and investigate. The best filters feature high quality optical glass that is precisely ground to insure that both surfaces are exactly parallel. Some filters consist of a colored membrane sandwiched between layers of glass while the better ones have glass which is dyed in the process of creating the optical glass itself. Where membranes or foils are used, they should be of the utmost quality. Cheap filters may, in time, de-laminate or develop Newtons rings and become semi-opaque and therefore useless. Many better filters are coated, just like your lenses, to prevent flare and the accompanying loss of contrast. The quality of the filter mount or frame factors in as well. Cheap mounts are less dimensionaly stable and can cause cross-threading and get stuck on you lenses' filter mounts. In certain cases BLACK filter mounts are best as they prevent certain reflections from stray light.

In my own work, many of my images require great degrees of enlargement so when filters are utilized, I usually stick with my B+W and Singh-Ray filters. For less critical use, I have had good results form Tiffen, Hoya, Harrison & Harrison, Zeiss and Schneider brands. At one point in time, I was given to understand that many of the Japaneses camera manufacturers outsourced the filter production to Hoya and many of the German companies did likewise with B+W, Schneider and Zeiss. I am not sure if this is still the case.

A few of my Singh-Ray Polarizing filters have built in color and image enhancing effects- I like those features because it is not a good idea to stack filters if more than one is required.

The Sing-Ray and B+W filters that I purchased many decades ago, are still in fine shape. Both Harrison & Harrison and Tiffen, at one time, manufactured filters for cinematographic applications. These were of extremely high optical quality and may still be available on the used market. There are a few new brands and suppliers that I am not familiar with and I only recommend gear that I have experience with or are of time honored known quality. Knowing some of the aforementioned facts can help you in shopping and purchasing filters.

I don't miss the drawers full of filters but the science and technology was kind fun. In black and white film work, one needed to understand how various filters worked with films of different color or spectral sensitivities. In color work there is the mired values as the related to color temperature. Filter factors were not the same for every film and filter combination. A trusty and expensive color temperature meter was a required accessory. With transparency work, each new batch of film (emulsion batch) came with its own challenges. Professional films came with a basic filter pack recommendation to normalize its color response. Lots of testing was required to make certain that the resulting transparencies would be of good reproduction quality for lithographic printing. Each brand a type of color film had its own "color palette" ,degree of saturation, color bias, grain structure and speed. Nowadays the are simple camera settings and rather easy editing adjustments. I never take digital photography for granted!

I hope this helps.

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Aug 14, 2017 11:39:29   #
Jim Bob
 
cbtsam wrote:
I need to obtain a 77mm circular polarizing filter, and I've read some stuff suggesting that Breakthrough Photography makes some pretty great stuff, but it's pretty expensive, about $150.00 for a 77mm filter. Anybody have any experience that can challenge, or vouch for, the quality of this product? Or, of course, suggest an less expensive alternative.


I can vouch for the UVs and NDs. Exceptional quality with a 25 year warranty to boot. Have not tried the CPLs.

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Aug 14, 2017 20:48:43   #
cbtsam Loc: Monkton, MD
 
Thanks for all your help. I just ordered the Breakthrough.

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Aug 14, 2017 20:50:37   #
boomer826 Loc: Florida gulf coast
 
cbtsam wrote:
Thanks for all your help. I just ordered the Breakthrough.


Good choice!

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Aug 14, 2017 22:00:14   #
repleo Loc: Boston
 
cbtsam wrote:
Thanks for all your help. I just ordered the Breakthrough.


Let us know what you think of it when you've tried it out.

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