How Many Types Of Filters Are There In Photography?

Photography Explained Podcast Episode 136 - How Many Types Of Filters Are There In Photography?

Right - here is the answery bit

There are many different types of filters in photography, which I will split into two distinct categories.

• Ones that you attach to a camera lens
• Ones that exist in software.

Filters are used to enhance both image capture and images in post processing.

Yes, having regretted picking this as the subject for this podcast episode, I realised that for a whole generation of people filters are not things that you attach to a camera lens, but things that you apply in an App on your phone.

What’s next?
Episode 137 - My Call For Questions From You. And Your Help

Transcript

How Many Types Of Filters Are There In Photography? Hi and welcome to Episode 136 of the Photography Explained podcast.

I’m your host Rick, and in each episode I will try to explain one photographic thing to you in plain English in less than 10 minutes (ish) without the irrelevant details. What I tell you is based on my lifetime of photographic experience. And not Google. OK there was some Google in this one.

Right - here is the answery bit

There are many different types of filters in photography, which I will split into two distinct categories.

• Ones that you attach to a camera lens
• Ones that exist in software.

Filters are used to enhance both image capture and images in post processing.

 Yes, having regretted picking this as the subject for this podcast episode, I realised that for a whole generation of people filters are not things that you attach to a camera lens, but things that you apply in an App on your phone.

 So in this episode I am going to travel from when I was a young lad and bought things that I attached to my lens to the very modern day and filters in 2022.

 And I am not going to lie to you, (why do I say that?), I know a lot more about old school filters than modern day fangled filters.

 Brace yourselves, this could be a bumpy ride!

 Filters that I use

I use filters that attach to the front of my camera lens. 

I use Neutral Density and Polarizing filters. If you didn’t know that – where have you been? Check out the last two episodes of the splendid Photography Explained Podcast, ND Filters - What Are They? What Do They Do? Do I Need One?, and Polarizing Filters - What Are They? What Do They Do? Do I Need One?

Any other filters that I used were way back in the film days, long before all this clever digital stuff ever existed.

So what other filters are there then?

 Protector filters

These are filters that protect the front lens element. They provide a physical barrier. I used to use these but no longer do, and nothing bad happened.

I am not saying to you that you do not need them, and if you want to protect that precious front lens element then fine. I do not know how well you look after you gear, but I do know how well I look after my gear.

Top tip – always use the lens hood though. Which is what I do.

UV and Skylight filters

These filters used to be used to reduce UV light hitting the film, but most digital cameras have this somewhere within the sensor these days so these are really not needed any more. So people use them to protect the front lens element.

Which is fine if you want to.

 Graduated ND filters

These are ND filters which have a gradual effect, going from full at the top reducing down to nothing somewhere near the middle. Not a great description granted, so if I explain what they do this should help.

I used to use these to balance out the exposure, by darkening a very bright sky above a dark foreground. The top half of the filter had darkening stuff in it, the bottom half nothing.

Again digital advances mean that this can be done in camera now using auto-bracketing. It does pretty much the same thing, taking a darker photo of the sky which you merge together in your software of choice with the correctly exposed foreground.

I do not have these filters anymore.

Special effect filters

I used to have a starburst filter, which made lights and the sun starbursty. Now I just use F22 to get enough of an effect for me when I want to. Try this with your lenses and see what starburst effects you get – it can be pretty cool.

And there are all sorts of other filters out there that do funky stuff, but these are not for me. Oh no. And I would imagine that pretty much any effect that you can get with a funky filter can be recreated in Photoshop, if you know how to use Photoshop that is.

Which I do not.

Nearly forgot - colour filters

I’ve never used these, which I believe are used to change the white balance. As I shoot in RAW I can change the white balance in Lightroom so I have no need for these.

Close up filters

These are used to erm take photos close up. I have never used one of these, as I do not take photos of things close up.

And the top tip

Different camera lenses have different filter thread sizes. If you are going to use filters buy it/ them for the largest filter thread size that you have, and invest in step down rings – that means that you only need one filter, which could save you a ton of cash.

Other filters – the digital ones

Well, there are so many of these.

Instagram filters spring to mind. One click and boom, you have transformed a photo. And there are many, many others. So many that all I want to say is that these filters are used to change photos that you have already taken to get a certain look or style of photo.

And you can add any kind of image processing software to that list – I can create presets for my photos in Lightroom that instantly transform photos just how I want them to.

These presets are exactly the same as Instagram or any other filters.

OK – that was a lot shorter than I intended.

The talky bit

Before I go on, let me explain what happened this week. See life just got in the way and I failed to publish this episode on time. I even wrote a backup script which said “if you can hear this bit you are listening to the unedited episode. Life things got in the way and I did not have time to edit this episode before publishing.”

I didn’t even get time to record the full episode. But then I had a word with myself, and convinced myself that it was OK. Did it really matter that this episode was going to be published two days late?

No it really did not. I think I lost a bit of perspective there. So here I am now, and all is fine. So I will continue. Back to those filters.

There are two types of filters, ones that you attach to a camera lens which changes the image capture in one way or another. Or just protect that front lens element.

And then there is all that other stuff that you can do using apps and software after the event. 

Getting the look you want for your photos is the point. I won’t go on about ND and Polarizing filters here, I told you all you need to know in previous episodes. These filters are used for specific purposes when taking photos. These filters help me to take better photos. These filters are tools that I use in my work.

I don’t use Instagram filters, but I am sure you know what they do. You can quickly give photos a distinct look, which when applied to a load of photos in a feed gives a consistent look and feel.

And what I do with my photos in Lightroom is in some ways exactly the same. After all filters are changing the colours, tones, focus, borders, all sorts of stuff. There are currently 25 filters in Instagram - and yes I had to look that up.

But if you think about it, what I do in Lightroom is the same, well similar. I use Lightroom to adjust the tones, contrast, sharpness, shadows, highlights, vibrance, saturation, all that good stuff.

So really they are the same as they are taking a photo and making it look different, and hopefully better. Just done in a different way.

And when I create a Lightroom preset to save me time that is pretty much what an Instagram filter is.

Let’s not overthink this ok?

As far as I am concerned filters are great, as is digital processing. But you have to do this well, naturally and consistently.

I edit my work in pretty much the same way, I have a fixed process, and I have created presets for the things that I do all the time. I do not need any other filters as my work is done n Lightroom. What we can do with software has reduced the need for many filters.

Why don’t I use a filter to protect my lens?

Dead simple. I used to use a fisheye zoom lens. I miss that lens, crazy as it was. With a fisheye lens you get a 180 degree field of view, You get this by having a bulbous front lens element. And you cannot put a filter on this. I used this lens loads when I had it, and was super protective of the front lens element, and guess what – nothing bad happened.

So I stopped using them on all my lenses some years ago, and still nothing bad has happened.

I know what I am doing and take care of my gear, so I know that I am ok. As for you? It is your decision, your responsibility. I am not telling you to not use a protector filter, that is your decision to make dear listener.

As always, I am just telling you what I do ok? Talking of which

What do I do?

I use Neutral Density and Polarizing filters, and process images in Lightroom only. That is it. That is all that I do.

Next episode

Photography Explained Podcast Episode 137 – a call for questions. Yes, I am doing something different. I will be asking for your help. It will be a short episode, well it might not be, we’ll see, where just you and I have a little chat ok? I will tell you some of the things that I have planned and see what you think, I might even send out a survey to any willing participants.

But please join in and help me with my small but perfectly formed podcast.

If you can’t wait until then, if you have a photography question you would like me to answer, in plain English, in less than 10 minutes (ish), without the irrelevant details, just head over to PhotographyExplainedPodcast.com/start. You can also find out more about me and my podcast, and also ways to help me.

Go on, go over there now, and beat the rush!

So send me your question, or just say hi – it would be great to hear from you.

This episode was powered by, wait for it, a cheese sandwich with a bag of home crisps, Prawn Cocktail, washed down with a lovely ice cold Diet Pepsi, sat here in my not too warm, home-made, acoustically cushioned recording emporium (avoiding next doors gardening activities).

I’ve been Rick McEvoy, thanks again very much for listening to my small but perfectly formed podcast (it says here), and for giving me 10 (ish) minutes of your valuable time.

Take care, stay safe

Cheers from me Rick