BMPCC which Vari ND Filter and why?

Greetings all!

Does anyone have any experience (good or bad) with the Formatt / Hitech Multistop Variable ND on the BMCC or BMPCC?

We are currently using 122mm B+W MRC Solid NDs for handheld work with very wide lenses. A single variable ND would be much easier to handle but am worried about introducing softness/ghosting - the Formatt is the only one I can find in a 105mm size which is the smallest our rigs will take and probably the smallest we can get away with in terms of not creating too much vignetting.

Finally bought the Genustech Eclipse 77mm.
Outer thread is 82mm.

77mm is probably way too large for me. 46-55mm would work much better in run&gun

Which means you'll never buy a lens with a thread larger than 58mm (I assume that's what you meant).

It means I don't need a Variety ND for any of my lenses that have a larger diameter (100-300) and I find a filter that is 2cm larger then the lens in practical (can't mount the lens hood anymorer) and dangerous to the filter (no lens hood, no lens cap).

Anyway, the question was about Various ND with integrated IR Cut and about Vari ND starting brighter then ND2.

Thanks for this link Frank. I was just about ready to ask the question of which IR cut filter I should stack on the Eclipse. Any other thoughts out there?

Heliopan 82m Digital Filter for $165.40 on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B000UGO8NY/ref=dp_olp_new?ie=UTF8&condition=new

Very helpful

I bought the genustech ND eclipse along with the hoya 82mm ir + uv cut filter and am really dissapointed.

On a birght sunny day shooting wide open with the sigma 18-35 I get terrible magenta cast on my footage. I couldnt say if this was from the nd itself or from ir pollution but regardless..after spending over £200 on filters its dissapointing to still get crap colour out of the camera

I bought the genustech ND eclipse along with the hoya 82mm ir + uv cut filter and am really dissapointed.

On a birght sunny day shooting wide open with the sigma 18-35 I get terrible magenta cast on my footage. I couldnt say if this was from the nd itself or from ir pollution but regardless..after spending over £200 on filters its dissapointing to still get crap colour out of the camera

Well that is disappointing. I know many of us have similar setups and are quite happy with the results. Try shooting with and without the IR Cut to see how much it is helping. Also try shooting at different levels of ND power. The more ND you apply, the more IR you will get.

All that aside, do you really need to be shooting wide open on a f1.8 lens (1.0 with speed booster) on a bright sunny day?

I bought the genustech ND eclipse along with the hoya 82mm ir + uv cut filter and am really dissapointed.

On a bright sunny day shooting wide open with the sigma 18-35 I get terrible magenta cast on my footage. I couldnt say if this was from the nd itself or from ir pollution but regardless..after spending over £200 on filters its dissapointing to still get crap colour out of the camera

Well that is disappointing. I know many of us have similar setups and are quite happy with the results. Try shooting with and without the IR Cut to see how much it is helping. Also try shooting at different levels of ND power. The more ND you apply, the more IR you will get.

All that aside, do you really need to be shooting wide open on a f1.8 lens (1.0 with speed booster) on a bright sunny day?

It is disappointing and not something I was expecting.

I totally do not need to shoot wide open on a bright sunny day..I did so to test the shallow dof and how effective the IR cut and ND combo worked together under extreme conditions..

here is one of the videos in question with the strong pink/magenta cast



Now is this pink cast from sever IR Pollution (dont see any real issues with blacks being purple??) or is this simply from heavy use of ND?...I assume for me to get to wide open F1.0 on the lens I would have been a pretty much full strength on the Eclipse?

If simply cutting back on the heavy nd would remove or at least alleviate the cast I would be happy...but for now I want to know what is causing the issue. I will be doing more tests this weekend but as I said before I tempted to go bare bones with no nd and ir cut and hope that I have enough fstops to exposue correctly in the middle of the day with no nd!

Again, go for a 'real' ND (Hoya, best) and UV/IR Cut and NOT VariND combination of two polarized lens that more the time are greenish or pink/magenta contaminated.
no to mention the bad skin tone you get it!!!!

Not all IRNDs are good and not all VariNDs are bad.

I have the Tiffen 77mm VariND and the 77mm Tiffen T1 IR cut filter.

I recently bought the Schneider Platinum series IRND 4x4 for my matte box.

I tested them out the other day and the results were surprising. The Tiffen VariND was the cleanest. On it's own, without the T1. However, that's only up to 5 stops. After 5 stops you start to see some x pattern distortion. In the example below, you can see the top right and bottom left corners are brighter than the rest of the image. Turn the filter down on tick and this effect disappears. So I would recommend the Tiffen VariND up to 5 stops if you are shooting a rendered codec (like prores) and can't change your WB after the fact.

These were all shot on my BMCC 2.5K EF mount, Rokinon 16mm 2.2 @ f4 (except clean which was f22) at 180 degree shutter, ISO 400, Prores (except for RAW test), video mode.

EDIT: these were all shot at 5000K
And yes, I am wearing sticky notes.

Clean
Dropped the exposure to f22 and shorten my shutter angle to 90 degrees.




Tiffen 77mm VariND at 6 stops.
It's remarkably clean for having no IR cut. Literally, if I had dropped my exposure and kept the ND to one setting lower, this image would be quite usable. There is ever so slightly some IR pollution, but it's still good.




Tiffen 77mm VariND at 6 stops with the Tiffen T1 IR cut filter
Hello green cast! Adding the T1 IR cut filter changes introduces an obvious and unusable colour cast across the image. If your shooting anything but RAW, I would avoid this combo. Yes, you can bring it back in resolve too, but why spend the time when another combo doesn't? It's 1 click if you shoot RAW.




Tiffen 77mm VariND at 6 stops with the Tiffen T1 IR cut filter (shot in RAW and WB corrected. No other changes)
This was a minor correction to the WB setting and it completely removed the green cast from the T1. So this effect is uniform across the image and easily fixed, if you shoot raw. This is the cleanest result and best blacks, next to the clean image.




Schneider Platinum IRND 1.5
Nice eh! I guess the issue is the wavelength that the filter cuts IR is much too high for the BMCC. Unfortunately, Schneider doesn't list the wavelength on their website/manual.




Schneider Platinum IRND 1.5 with Tiffen T1 IR cut filter
Adding the IR cut bring this image back from the grave. It's a shame really as I was trying to avoid having to use 2 filters, but the image does clean up nicely.



I have read that people have had better results with hot mirror NDs, so I suppose I'll one next. Also, I shoot mostly indoors, so I'm surprised how much ND I'm going to need outdoors!!

Anyway, these are my findings from a quick and dirty test.

[CaptainHook]

Sean, is there a reason you won't go for the newer Hoya ProND's ? (assuming most people have checked out that thread on BMCuser now).

The Tiffen T1 is only suppose to be 'good' up to 0.9 or 3 stops of ND according to their website so prob not doing all it can with the Schneider. I tried the Tiffen VariND with Hoya IR Cut and was surprised it looked better to me than their IRND combos!

Pocket Cam - http://www.bmcuser.com/showthread.php?6 ... #post97497

4K Cam - http://www.bmcuser.com/showthread.php?6 ... post108645

Warning - tons of frames in the above links which compare the new Hoyas and TIffen IRNDs plus TIffen VariND.

Sean, is there a reason you won't go for the newer Hoya ProND's ? (assuming most people have checked out that thread on BMCuser now).

The Tiffen T1 is only suppose to be 'good' up to 0.9 or 3 stops of ND according to their website so prob not doing all it can with the Schneider. I tried the Tiffen VariND with Hoya IR Cut and was surprised it looked better to me than their IRND combos!

Pocket Cam - http://www.bmcuser.com/showthread.php?6 ... #post97497

4K Cam - http://www.bmcuser.com/showthread.php?6 ... post108645

Warning - tons of frames in the above links which compare the new Hoyas and TIffen IRNDs plus TIffen VariND.

Because Hoya doesn't make 4x4 filters...or at least I can't find any.

The Tiffen T1 worked great with the Schneider IRND at 1.5...but it defeats the point.

I want 1.2 to 2.1 NDs for my matte box (4x4). Not screwed on the lens. And I don't want any IR pollution in my BMCC with that config. I would prefer to get this in a single glass filter.

What is the magical product for this? I thought the Schneider Platinum IRND would be exactly this, but it's so horrible. However, Adrian has the same filter and he's getting great results, so maybe I had a defect? I've also been told a hot mirror ND is what I really want.

Thanks for posting your links..I was looking for them this morning and couldn't find it.

2 things about your tests.

1. I would have preferred direct sunlight. You're not reflecting enough IR off the subject unless you're lighting them directly. That's the torture test.

2. Are you sure those are flares and not the x pattern common to variNDs? My Tiffen variND showed the exact same "effect" but it moved/disappeared when rotating the ring back and forth around the max setting.

I like the Tiffen VariND, at all settings but max, maybe 1 tick below max. It's quite good.

I want a solution for my matte box however.

[CaptainHook]

No probs!

#1 No way was i gonna get my GF to stand in direct sunlight for 3-4 hours like we did testing all 3 BMD cams. As it was, we both got pretty dehydrated even with drinking quite a bit of water. It was already a torture test, just a different kind. Plus, it's more than enough to show how rubbish the Tiffens are compared to the Hoyas. There's actually a huge bright wall directly behind cam bouncing a ton of light at her, i think this is more realistic of how i would actually shoot. I'd never place someone in direct sunlight like that unless i absolutely had no choice, but so far i've managed to avoid it when filming.

#2 Could be, but i found during another shoot the VariND would flare MUCH easier than anything else i tried on the lens. And it looked VERY similar looking at the footage later, then flagging it off looked much better. I wasn't using a mattebox for either shoot. Prob a bit of both but flagging REALLY helped.

For a mattebox solution the only thing i've seen as good or better than the Hoya ProNDs are the TrueNDs.

http://www.dvinfo.net/article/optical-s ... m-all.html

Apparently using the same tech as the Hoyas (the TrueND's came out first).

No probs!

#1 No way was i gonna get my GF to stand in direct sunlight for 3-4 hours like we did testing all 3 BMD cams. As it was, we both got pretty dehydrated even with drinking quite a bit of water. It was already a torture test, just a different kind. Plus, it's more than enough to show how rubbish the Tiffens are compared to the Hoyas. There's actually a huge bright wall directly behind cam bouncing a ton of light at her, i think this is more realistic of how i would actually shoot. I'd never place someone in direct sunlight like that unless i absolutely had no choice, but so far i've managed to avoid it when filming.

#2 Could be, but i found during another shoot the VariND would flare MUCH easier than anything else i tried on the lens. And it looked VERY similar looking at the footage later, then flagging it off looked much better. I wasn't using a mattebox for either shoot. Prob a bit of both but flagging REALLY helped.

For a mattebox solution the only thing i've seen as good or better than the Hoya ProNDs are the TrueNDs.

http://www.dvinfo.net/article/optical-s ... m-all.html

Apparently using the same tech as the Hoyas (the TrueND's came out first).

$$$$$$$$$$ Cha-Ching

Also, only 4x5.65

I was thinking of buying the tiffen 77mm variable nd for the pocket.
Can I use the Hoya UV/IR cut filter on top?(http://amzn.to/1bRhaVZ)

What is the tiffen out ring size? 82mm?

I know the Hoya prond are better but I need a quick setup so I need a variable ND.
Any other advice?
The Eclipse and the Tiffen are about the same price where I live.

Thanks

SLR Magic Variable ND mkII Review

This is a very interesting post.
I bought a Genustech VND and a Heliopan Digital after seeing Frank G's blog a few years ago.
Without having done an impirical test, I now prefer a VND to onboard ND wheeels, which are not usually near the standard of a good VND, even on top end broadcast cameras.

Given the choice of onboard vs attachable, either by a matte box or VND, I would choose them in preference to a camera with built in onboard ND's.