I've never really used filters before and managed to pick up a Tiffen polarizing filter really cheap last month on ebay. I never got the chance to try it until a few weekends ago....

A friend of mine commented that the photo looks almost unnatural (which was ok with me personally), but made me begin to wonder...


1) What does a high-end filter provide that a lower-end filter does not.. I could probably buy 5 of these Tiffen filters for the price of one B+H polarizing filter
2) I only have one filter (not counting the plain UV filter on all my lenses), but are there some "basic" filters people keep in the bag?


Photo in question btw:


Exposure: 0.033 sec (1/30)
Aperture: f/11.0
Focal Length: 27 mm
Focal Length: 27.5 mm
ISO Speed: 200
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: No Flash

 

Id like to know as well. I use tiffen filters and they do the job.

 

I don't think there's anything "unnatural" looking about your photo.

That said, the background is wayyy out of control. Too busy. Lots of tones and shadows causing distraction....which could explain your friend's comments. Too difficult to focus on the subject.

 

i think the composition is the problem. I would have brought the car a bit further away from the background and brought your aperture as open as possible...this would have changed the depth of field and blurred the background more, giving you better framing and depth. In your case here, the polarizer helped by killing glass glare and bringing out the blue and the green (assuming you used it correctly)

 

Basic UV filters functions as a protector of your lenses front element.

As far as UV filters go, the high-end ones by Hoya and B+W keeps the images un-altereed as if there were no filter. Cheap ones reduces sharpness and causes flares in certain lightning conditions.

Just go to Hvstar.net and get them from Hong Kong for cheap