- Today, we're talking about ND filters,
and why you need these for video.
Also, we're talking about this brand new ND filter
from PolarPro.
It's the Peter McKinnon edition, and this thing is amazing.
(upbeat music)
So this is something awesome
that I've been waiting for for a while.
This is the ND filter from PolarPro,
but it's not just a single ND filter.
They now make veritable ND filters
which basically allows you to change the strength
of the ND on the filter while you're out filming
so you don't have to carry a bunch
of different ND filters with you.
So let's talk about why you need ND filters in general
especially for video shooters.
There's different needs for video and photo,
and mainly what I shoot is video, so ND filters
are super important if you want to get shallow depth
of field, you want to get that cinematic look.
So when you're shooting video, if you have an ND filter,
what it basically allows you to do is bring down
your shutter speed so that you can get double that
of your frame rate, and so what happens when you get
double that of your frame rate, is that your footage gets
to that cinematic look.
The issue when you have a high shutter speed
is that your footage becomes super jittery,
and that's not very cinematic.
So when you're trying to get the shallow depth of field,
you have to open your aperture up as wide as possible.
So on this lens, it's a 2.8, right now I'm shooting at a 2.8
which allows me to get some blur in the background.
I'm shooting micro 4/3 so it's not gonna be super out
of focus, but when I show you with my 85mm lens,
you can really see how the background
is thrown out of focus.
Now the issue is that lets a ton of light into the sensor,
so you're not gonna be able to get that shallow depth
of field look when you're shooting at low shutter speeds
and having your aperture wide open.
So you have to compensate, and to compensate,
a lot of times what you would do if you don't have
an ND filter is you're gonna boost your shutter speed
and what happens is when your shutter speed gets super high,
you're gonna get that really jittery look
because it's freezing action,
and you don't want to freeze action to get cinematic look.
You want to basically have a little bit of motion blur,
and that's what makes videos look good
is having a little bit of motion blur.
So to get that, you have to have your shutter speed
at double that of your frame rate.
So I'm shooting at 30 frames a second, my shutter speed
is at 1/60 and to do this, I have my ND filter on.
And so I'm using the PolarPro ND filter, it's veritable,
so as you can see, I can open it up, it's super bright,
bring it down, five stops of ND allows me to be
at 30 frames a second, 60 shutter speed, a 2.8,
and my ISO is around a 400 so it allows me to get
a good looking image with my aperture wide open
and my shutter speed at double that of my frame rate.
Now if you don't care about the jittery look and all
of that, then you can just close down your shutter speed,
but honestly it looks so much better when you get
your shutter speed to double that of your frame rate
and you can get more of that cinematic look.
It will just make your videos in general look so much better
and that's why you would need ND filters for shooting video
specifically and why I use them.
With every piece of video content that I shoot,
I always have an ND filter on the lens.
So let's talk about this Peter McKinnon edition
PolarPro veritable ND filter.
What makes this so special is that it is a multiple stop
ND filter so that you can change the exposure
without having the replace the filter,
so you just have to spin it and then it goes darker,
and you can open it brighter and darker,
and there's two editions.
There's a two to five stop, and there's a six to nine stop.
For video shooters, if you're trying to get
that shallow depth of field, I highly suggest getting
the two to five stop, that's what I found is kind of
in the range for most situations.
Or you could just put one of these on the lens,
and that's all you need for basically a bunch
of different lighting conditions.
So Peter McKinnon worked with PolarPro to make sure
that this is a filter that he would actually use
and the one thing that I think really stands out
is that with a veritable ND filter, it has hard stops
so it doesn't spin infinitely, it stops at each end
of the spectrum which a lot of veritable NDs don't have
that functionality so that when you're spinning it
to one way or the other, it keeps rotating,
and it actually messes with the ND,
and you'll get some weird warping effects,
and that's not something that you'll ever get
with one of these filters.
One other thing about this ND filter is that it comes
with an awesome lens cap which protects your lens.
It's a little thing, but little things go a long way
and also just the packaging around this whole filter,
it's pretty amazing what it comes with,
it's quite an experience when you get this filter
in your hand.
I highly suggest if you want to get that shallow depth
of field, if you want to bring your shutter speed down
so that you can get that more cinematic look,
then get one of these veritable ND filters
'cause it's gonna make your life so much easier.
This is gonna be the filter that I'm gonna have
on my cameras whenever I'm out shooting,
and it definitely makes it so I don't have to carry around
a bunch of extra gear, I just need to bring the one filter
and it covers a ton of lighting conditions.
Guys if you want to know more about this PolarPro ND filter,
I'll put a link down below in the description
where you can check it out and guys, that's it.
I'll see ya on the next one.