Filters are made up of glass and optical resins that can get damaged easily with scratches. here are a few tips to help you store filters safely and carefully.

Filter Stackers- Filter stackers are an excelent way to store your filters of same size. They kep your filters clean and ready to use. it consists of two metal caps, one male and the other female. Of course, having a robust and reliable camera bag, such as the Lowepro SlingShot 200 AW, provides extra protection to the stacker and filters. In order to form a stacker, all you need to do is screw the filters together nd put the metal caps by screwing on the threads on both open ends. The stacker keeps your filters secure.
See the picture on the side.

Lubricate threads- lubricate the stacker threads and filter threads to avoid jamming when they are stacked up together. You can use graphite and oil to lubricate the screw threads.

Filter wallets- Using filter wallets is also an efficient way of storing filters without screws. Filter wallets help you organize filter nicely and avoid jamming problems also.

Avoid touching- Avoid touching filters since they are very delicate and any fingerprints or scratching would spoil them. Some filters can’t even be cleaned, hence should be kept completely clean.

Have a look at the pictures on your left. The first picture has been taken without a filter and the second one with a star filter. The photo with the star filter gives a very gentle and beautiful appeal to a usual candlelight.

Star filters are made up of plain glass which is etched with lines in a grid pattern. Sometimes star filters also use prisms or fine diffraction gratings embedded in the glass. These filters are available in various categories from 2 star filters, which spread out light in two directions, to 8 star filters that give out light in 8 directions, depending on their construction. These filters are used by photographers to give a dreamy romantic feel to the frame. Even though pre-made effects filters, like the Cokin P 056, are fairly inexpensive, they can also be made at home. All you need to do is take an old UV filter and etch it with a glass cutter. Almost all star filters contain screws and can be mounted in front of the lens. To get best results they must be used at a low aperture so that the star effect is noticeable.

Net filters are available in various colours, widths and sizes to fit on to the lenses. These are also called Grid filters and are made up of a fine mesh or a net sandwiched between glass or metal holders. Net filters can also be made at home by stretching a piece of nylon or pantyhose in front of the lens.

These filters are used to give a grid effect or a dreamy look to the scene. If you have been clicking for long then you must have realised that all pictures do not look the best when they are sharp. Some scenes give a better feel with a diffused look. Net filters are also used to decrease the contrasts in the image. If you look at the picture on your right, this picture has been taken through a net filter and you can see that contrast is not very high. The blues and the whites in the picture seem to be in the same tone, but they blend very well. The image offers a diffused dreamy look, as if its right out of a fairytale, but if you go closer you would see that there is a grid pattern in the picture. Net or grid filters are also used to give a nostalgic feel to the image.

A typical focal plane shutter consists of two curtains. In some shutters the curtains are horizontal or vertical. As you can see in the picture on left, one curtain is known as the opening curtain and another curtain behind it is called the closing curtain. At a shutter speed that is slower than the critical shutter speed, or the X sync of the camera, the front curtain opens, exposes the film and then the closing shutter follows after the set time interval. On the other hand, if the shutter speed is at a speed faster than the X sync, then the opening curtain opens and the closing shutter closely follows, thus exposing each segment of the film frame for an equal interval. The diagram on the right shows the shutter mechanism at a speed faster than the X sync. The green curtain is the opening shutter and red one is the closing shutter.

Horizontal focal plane shutters are convenient for motion photography, but problematic for electronic flash guns. This is because as the curtain travels the entire length of the film, the film is only exposed for a brief instant and this is when the flash gun is flashed. Therefore, the time set for the shutter should be higher than the amount of time the 1st curtain takes to open completely. This is the X sync of the camera, the speed at which the film frame is completely exposed for an instant before the closing shutter starts to close.

In a simple leaf construction, the shutter prevents the film from getting exposed and is exposed only when the shutter is released for the specified amount of time. The Diaphragm leaf shutters are usually placed in between the lens or behind the lens (see the picture on left); hence another mechanism needs to be employed to prevent the film from getting exposed in between the exposures.

Simple leaf shutters usually have a single leaf that pivots, in order to allow the light to enter when the shutter is triggered. Some leaf shutters also have two pivoting leaves with curved edges, thereby creating a sort of circular opening. Simple leaf shutters have great precision and were initially used in disposable cameras. These days some of the most expensive and high precision cameras also use a leaf shutter mechanism, as it offers a much higher speed than focal plane shutters. Moreover, leaf shutters are known to achieve speeds of up to 1/40,000. Leaf shutters also have another advantage over focal plane shutters; namely, they work perfectly in sync with electronic flash guns, like the professional Pentax AF-540. Unlike focal plane shutters where you have to restrict yourself to the sync speed to use flash, the leaf shutter mechanism allows you to use a flash even at speeds as fast as 1/ 224,000th of a second. For these very reasons leaf shutter cameras are extensively used for studio photography and high speed motion photography.

Green and red filters record the same tone of grey. For instance, if you use a green filter, such as the Cokin P 004, for a black and white film, then the green colour in the frame will be recorded lighter, and red will be recorded darker. This is known as the law of transmission and absorption.

A yellow filter in a black and white film increases the contrast and records as seen by the naked eye. Orange filters, on the other hand, increase the contrast further to give a dramatic look. In black and white films, if you use a red filter while shooting, it will give you a three dimensional dramatic look. Without a filter the frame looks dull. When a yellow filter is being used the contrast increases a bit and more details of the picture subject become visible. When the red filter is used, the contrast further increases if green objects, such as grass or trees, are present in the photo. The end result is an interesting three dimensional look.

The ND filter or neutral density filter allows all colours and wavelengths of light to pass through it. The ND filter indirectly helps us to get the right exposure without the hassle of changing our shutter and aperture settings. It can be incredibly useful and an ND filter is included in the Canon Filter Set 46 U. Different ND filters have different effects on exposure. A 0.3 ND filter reduces light by 1 stop, 0.6 ND reduces by 2 stops and 0.9ND by 3 stops. Apart from reducing the exposure, ND filters also indirectly help achieve various other conditions that create more attractive pictures.

Decrease depth of field

A picture taken without an ND filter has a shallow depth of field, which means lesser objects in the frame are in focus. On the other hand, the depth of field is higher, and even the background is in focus, with an ND filter . This is because the ND filter decreases the light intensity, thereby allowing you to open the aperture more, and consequently decreasing the f stop, as well as decreasing the depth of field.

Use of slower shutter speed and high speed film
Since a ND filter decreases the light intensity, it allows shooting at a lower shutter speed and obtaining motion blur without worrying about over exposure. It also allows for the use of high speed film because the intensity of light is already reduced and high speed film can help capture fast moving objects.

For the uninitiated, the visible spectrum of light is made up of 7 colours that stretches from red to violet (see the picture). Red light in the spectrum has the longest wavelength and the violet has shortest. The light which has a wavelength shorter than the violet light is called as Ultra violet light. This UV light is not visible to us from the naked eye and does not have much effect on us either, but it has an effect on the photography film that we use.

A photographic film is called the tripack film; this is because it is made up of 3 layers of primary colours: Red, Blue and Green. The red layer is sensitive to red light, green to green light but blue layer is not only sensitive to violet but Ultra Violet also. Now if UV light also reacts with the blue layer then your image that you obtain on the film will have bluish tinge to it. This is the major reason as to why we use UV filters in photography.

Since digital cameras have sensors instead of Film, they are less sensitive to UV light, but it is still advisable to use UV filters in digital cameras as their sensors can get affected. The Sigma UV 62mm EX DG MC UV filter, for example, has been digitally optimised for use in digital cameras. A UV filter is very easy to use. It just needs to be mounted in front of the lens as most UV filters are available as screw attachments. You can use UV filters can be used for any duration while shooting outdoors as they allow all the visible light to enter the camera, hence do not have any negative effects on your image.

A number of you might not have heard of this shutter mechanism, and that is because this kind of shutter was used initially in cameras because it was simple and easy to construct. Univex Mercury and Olympus Pen Ft are two major still cameras that were manufactured with a rotary shutter. This kind of shutter is primarily used in motion picture cameras and projectors. Of course, even analogue cameras like the Leica R9, no longer use this mechanism, and it is quite outdated. In still cameras, as you can see in the picture on your left, the shutter is in the form of a rotating disc with a circular opening. As the shutter is released, the circular opening in the disc aligns itself with film and the set aperture and the image is captured on film. The cameras that were manufactured with rotary shutters were primarily half frame 35mm cameras; that is to say the image was captured on half a frame of the 35mm film.

Rotary shutters can be within the lens as well as on the focal plane. The shutter was extremely elegant and precise. The unique feature of this kind of shutter mechanism was that it could be synchronized with an electronic flash at all shutter speeds, even at 1/250. One major characteristic and identifying feature of rotary shutter cameras is the unusual hump on the top intended to accommodate the circular shutter. (see the picture on right).

For those who have no clue about photography, you must be wondering why the word ‘shutter bug’ is often used interchangeably with camera. Well, this is because a camera has a shutter which, along with the lens opening or the aperture, controls the exposure of your film or censors. If you are a budding photographer, then knowing a little about shutter speed and the shutter mechanism can help you achieve higher impact photographs.

If you have ever handled a camera, then you must have seen certain readings like 1 sec, 1/30 sec, 1/125 sec and so on. These are the shutter speed readings. After setting your frame and aperture, when you press the click button, that’s when your lens aperture opens to the settings that you have set, and the shutter also opens to the set time, in order to expose the film to light.

Photography is all about writing with light, and the shutter is one element that controls the amount of light entering your film plane. A shutter opens in an acyclic manner, as described in the picture. Every position comes twice, once while opening the shutter and a second time while closing.

But a shutter doesn’t open completely all the time. At speeds higher than 1/60 sec, that is to say 1/250 sec or 1/1000 sec, the shutter only opens for a split second. Hence, it is necessary that at such shutter speeds, lighting conditions should be constant and aperture should be high so as to expose the film or sensor properly. Fortunately, modern cameras, such as the Nikon D3, make adjusting the aperture extraordinarily simple. When the speeds are less than 1/60 sec, such as 1/30 sec, or 1 sec, the shutter remains open for a significant time due to the slow speed. Accordingly, it is necessary to keep the aperture low. 1/60 sec is a critical speed for flash, as flash is an instantaneous light source. Therefore, it is necessary that the shutter be open completely for proper exposure when the light is flash, and, as mentioned above, the shutter opens completely only at speeds below 1/60 sec.