Filter Stacking...

[Alex]

This is an excellent topic that rarely gets discussed. This topic came up as a result of Mikey B's topic post on Neutral Density, and Cameraguy and Actors responses to that topic.

I am of the opinion that less filters on the lens is better. If you need to put more than one filter on a Super-8 Camera, study if the most outside filter shows up on the outside corner of your camera when your camera is in the wide-angle setting.

Before buying any filters for your camera, determine the most ever filters you may put on your camera, (probably 2 or 3). I have stacked as many as four for five when I was doing daytime time-exposure.

Go to a photo-shop with your Super-8 camera, (that should blow the employees' minds! Tell them it's a "photo-digital motion" camera and that it just came out and you got the first one! [img]graemlins/devil.gif[/img] ) stack 3 filters on your Super-8 Camera, and see if you can see the filters in any of the corners of your viewfinder. If you can see any round edge in your viewfinder, called "vignetting", there is a "fix".

If you do see "vignetting" you may consider buying a "step-up" ring. A step-up ring does two things, it means you will need to buy bigger filters for your camera, and in the process prevent the vignetting you previously saw, and it will cost more to buy your filters because they will be of a bigger size! [img]frown.gif[/img]

[cameraguy]

I agree. I like to get filters that are one step up from the lens actual size. The 814XL-S has a 62mm filter ring so I mostly have 67mm filters for it. Of course you need a 62-67 step ring but I needed that anyway when I got the C-8 67 wide angle lens for the Canon.

Ebay is a great source for cheap filters. I recently got a Hoya new old stock filter for less than half of a brand new ones price.