This is a quick post on how to use something that you might already have and how to avoid the outrageous cost of a Lee Seven Five Circular Polarising Filter.
My observations are personal and not necessarily applicable to the whole of GCM Photographic. As I am no longer a full-time professional photographer I cannot justify this particular piece of equipment; nor can I benefit from related tax benefits. This leaves me having to use my imagination and creative and constructive skills.
In the picture above is an ordinary Cokin P size filter holder ring. These are available extremely cheaply and you can even get Chinese copies on EBay for silly money if you are prepared to wait for it to come from China.
You can also see a 77mm Step Down ring which is applied to the above Cokin P size filter ring using your favourite strong adhesive. Personally I use Araldite to align the circumferences so that the edges are equi-distant all-round.
Finally, you will notice that I have removed part of the edge of the circumference of the two rings, using a Dremel multi tool, to fit precisely and smoothly into the Lee Filter System Holder.
The next thing I needed to do was to test the filter system fitment on my Olympus Digital 12mm 1:2.0 ED MSC making sure that it fits and also that the filter does not clip or cause any vignetting in this combination due to the equivalent of a 24mm wide angle of view, which I am very pleased to say that it doesn’t. Please see picture below.
So I am now free to enjoy and use my STC Ultra Layer*CPL-M ND16 77mm. It is not only a CPL but also a 4 stop Neutral Density filter, so it’s a 2 in 1 which is great and works very well.If there is a down-side to this, it is that the fact that if you are using the front slot for the CPL, you only have one slot left to use. However I can use my Grad filter and have the CPL and ND in the front one. So three filters are more than enough for me.
The conclusion is that you don’t always have to spend an awful lot of money on expensive pieces of camera equipment if you have some very basic DIY skills.