Have just recently bought a P series ND Grad kit which consists of a ND2, ND4 and a ND8 filter set.
Also to start - I am very happy with the filter set and for anyone starting out with filters I found a cost effective alternative as I start out with filter usage.
Now I have the adaptor ring and about an hr to play with today I thought I would have a play to get a feel for using them.
Also thought it may be worthwhile posting some rough finding for those newer to photography and interested using grads.
This is a bit of a first for me in as much as posting a mini review but see how we go. Maybe lacking more technical appreciation of my mini test but hope if is of some interest to a few members.
I also have to say that I am still very much an amateur in photography and even newer to lanscape with Grads so any of the more experienced feel free to correct or comment for th benefit of all. The purpose of my test was to see how the grads handle more extreme conditions.

So, my interest in this short self learn this morning was to see how the filters may be used in direct sun as a lot of my photos will have semi direct sunrise or sunset on the horizon.
Sun was relatively intense for this time of the yr.

Gear: Canon 50D with Tamron SP AF 17-50 with P series cokin holder attached - all taken on tripod. Sun offset to the right.

The first shot is with ND8, around f18, AV mode - unprocessed

1a.


I think the grad does a good job of softening the light to allow better exposure of the foreground, I did notice any real flare issues out of the normal with the Tamron for this type of shot. Sharpness does seem ok and colours but there is a slight colour cast I think which is said to be a problem with Cokin grads.

The same image with some very quick and dirty processing - my real goal is to allow better processing of the forground that would normally be quite blown out in such strong sunlight.

1b.



The next two shot were using the ND4 and the ND8 stacked, I don't think I would stakc that often but was interested to see the effect.

This shot with the stacked filters and no processing

Flare seems no worse than I normall get in my Tammy. Colour, contrast etc look ok, colour cast is obvious but correctable I issume. Has really darkened the bright sky and allowed control of foreground exposure. Sharpness did appear impacted a little when viewed at 100% but not enough to conern me.

2a.


2b.

Again, same image with some quick and dirty processing -



I would same that my play session is not the most likely conditions I would be using grads but would save not totally unlikely. More so I was interested in the benefit of using the grads and wanted some strong sunlight for this test.

Anyway, I thought this may be of interest to some members as it was to me. I am very happy with the filter set and value they can add to a photo. Again, these shots are not typical of how I would use the grads but more around what they can do.

3. This last shot is a high apeture setting f22 directly into the sun as I had heard about reflections back into the camera. I would not think I would be taking shots with the sun so central but was interested to see. I think you can probably cound each element ring in my tammy.



OH!, and yes, there is a couple of dust bonnies on my sensor that I did not see the need to clone out but also interesting is how easily the dust tht had accumlated on the filter has come through.