Most commonly used filters

I'd be interested to know what are fellow leicaphiles' most commonly

used or favorite filters and why (excepting UV or filters used

predominantly to protect the lens surface).

For black & white, hands down, medium yellow. It's great for skies and is not too obtrusive on flesh tones (unlike orange & red). Alternatively, a No. 11 Yellow/Green filter can be used for same. Great with skies & foliage, and not bad with skin tones.

 

I don't shoot much color. The only filter I ever use is a KR1.5 which produces a slight warming effect. I'm sure the overwhelming choice, however, would be a polarizer.

I stopped using polarizers (except for cancelling reflections off windows and water) when I dumped K25 for Velvia in 1991. I find not only don't I need one but it actually overdoes the sky-darkening effect with the films I use (Elite 100, Provia 400F in addition to Velvia). In B&W I stopped using yellow filters ages ago, preferring an orange for landscapes and a green for the few people shots I have done. Very, very occasionally I'll use a CC40R or FLD or 80A or B for color correction under artificial lighting...but pretty much I've gone over to color neg for those situations. My most-used filters by a wide margin are graduated ND's.

#15 (deep yellow) matches the sensitivity of XP-2 to my normal eyeball vision. For color (Kodachrome 25) the Polarizer stays on the camera, because it can reduce many of the highlights to printable levels.

Light green (2x filter factor) w/Ilford B&W film, slightly darker

green (3 or 4x) w/Agfa, Kodak, or Fuji B&W. I prefer green to plain

yellow or orange because it darkens the sky a bit & lightens

foliage, but without washing out "Caucasian" skin tones as

much.

81B to take blue cast out of open shadow or high altitude color images.

(1) polarizer; (2) yellow green; (3) orange or red for dramatic skies (but they turn foliage too dark, thus the preference for green or polarizer).

Not sorry to say I use an Orange most of the time. It has its drawbacks, but for female skintone, its the best (for me at least) at hiding blemishes and irregularities.

 

Yellow-Green for outdoors to help lighten foliage, darken sky.

 

Up to now, no polarizer used on the M.

 

Also want to add... that the M6TTL meter seems to be a waaays off on the B+W Orange 40 filter, giving about a full stop underexposure. With the DeepRed filter, it seems to be about 2 stops under. That is, over and above its "own correction" due to less light entering the lens in the first place.

 

What that means is with the Orange filter, I rate my film at 200 instead of 400.

Peter: I shoot only color slides and my number one filter is the

UV (B+W MRC F-PRO.) this is used mostly for protection. As to

real filters, I use the 81B on cloudy days as well as the

Graduated ND (B+W Grad 502) for landscapes. Polarizers are

also essential but I agree with Jay that they are obviated with

either Provia 100/400 or especially Velvia. However, Polarizer +

Velvia = wild slides!!

Colour film....

 

UV , 81B (on dull days) , Polarizer occasionally but not very often nowadays.

 

B&W film.....

 

Yellow , Orange or Red depending upon subject type and conditions (and for Infra red a Hoya R72)