Consensus- Polarizer or grad ND .6 soft?

[NJHeart2Heart]

I am debating on my next photo equipment purchase. I have found that my biggest challenge since my D80 purchase has been the sky to land exposure difference. I am doing better with some experience and tweaking, but would like to better my odds at getting a more level exposure while maintaining a better contrast/saturation. I was set on a grad ND .6 soft break filter (with holder and adapter by Cokin) but have heard a lot of people swear by a polarizer as the great "fix it" filter.

What do all you landscapers tend to use when trying to level off sky/land exposure?

Thanks
NJHeart2Heart Dawn

[Robin Sarac]

To solve your problem, you eitehr need to expose mroe than once and deal with it in PS or get an ND grad filter. The polarizer is great, but it won't help with what you're talking about.

[Nicole]

I think it depends if you want a very specific purpose filter or one that has more uses. With the ND filter, you get to use to for landscapes. The end. With the polarizer, you can get better exposures of the ground with better exposures of the sky, but you can also remove reflections & make colours pop. I'd personally (may not apply to you at all) stick with a polarizer and probably play with lightening shadows in PS if the foreground wasn't as light as I wanted.

[hpebley3]

It depends on the types of shots your trying to get. They both have pros and cons. For example, a polarizer won't do anything if you're shooting sunrise/sunset (into the sun). But it makes a big difference if you're shooting 90 degrees to the sun. It also works for things that aren't land/sky photos; e.g. it can help a lot at a car show with no sky. The GND on the other hand works really well for sunrise/sunset but would look weird if used on a car shot.

If it were me, I'd get the polarizer first since to me is more general purpose. I do have ND filters on my wish list.

[drec]

i recently got my nd filter, mainly for landscapes. i like capturing water movement(waterfalls etc) and the results i get are worth the money. if i can't lower my fstops enough i'll combine my polariser aswell.

[wulf]

Personally I would love to have both but don't actually have either at the moment. I think the graduated ND filter would be of use for more than just landscapes. However, from what I have read, the polariser would open up options that couldn't be relatively easily simulated in post processing.

That is probably what I would go for first, although it sounds like the original poster might be better going for the grad. ND for the subjects they are taking at the moment.

Wulf

[Murtasma]

As a owner of both a good quality polarizer and many cokin filters including a series of ND filters you will get more use out of a polarizer intially. The soft fade cokin filters can be a challenenge to use properly. There are a few problems you will need to watch out for.

It's pretty easy to see the line where the cokin filter cuts off in the image. Usually you have to drop the ND filter down just under the tree line to make a realistic fade. However this affects the exposer of the tree. The place where these filters would wipe the floor of a polaizer is in scenes where the horizion is pretty flat such as the ocean or flat plains. Not to say ND filters have their place but they have draw backs as well. Another thing you need to keep in mind is bring a black cloth with you to cover your lens up to the cokin filter. Depending on where the sun is you can get a reflection from the back of the filter since they are larger then the lens and you can get spots on your image but blocking the reflection on the filter is an easy fix it's just an annoying thing. Also carrying around filters and a cokin system can be cumbersome.

I think a polaizer would be a better choice polizers also act as a ND filter that reduced lighti n the whole scene by about 1 stop a polaizer is more useful it can really help with a sky and if you combine a polizer and a cokin (which is physcailly hard to do) you can nail exposer just about every time. What I find works well is to use a polizer and the cokin but only bring the cokin filter down a little into the scene just cover the sky the polizer will take care of the fade between sky and trees.

Some of the really great cokin filters are the sunset filters, skylights and color filters. Also any filter that does not have a clear pass though area seems to work better. EX: The sunset filters are generally tinted all orange but have a darker orange at the top that fades into a lighter orange over the whole scene I use this filter a lot on sunsets. You can even create sunsets where there are no sunsets.

Go get yourself a poloraizer first you won't be upset.

[Murtasma]

Here is one sunset that I used the sunset cokin filter on.