(relaxing music)
- Have you ever wondered
how you can increase your color saturation,
so your images really pop
or remove unwanted glare of wet surfaces,
like leaves and rocks?
In this week's video,
we'll look at the most valuable filter you can own,
which is the polarizer and it's coming up now.
(relaxing music)
Hi everyone, I'm Adrian Rankin.
And I'm here to share with you the best tips and tools
to help you improve your own landscape photography.
I spent a lot of time outdoors in forest or woodlands
or in Australia, we call it the,
ah, no, we don't call it the forest,
we call it the bush. (laughs)
Got that wrong myself!
And today, I'm really excited to share with you
how you can improve your own photography,
by learning how to use a circular polarizer,
also known as a CPL.
So today's video, I'm gonna cover off,
either why you should consider using a CPL,
how to actually use it with a step-by-step walkthrough,
and look at some of the limitations around
when certain situations you shouldn't be able to,
well not shouldn't be,
certain situations where it may not be a good idea
to use a CPL.
Pretty much everything you need to know
to start using a CPL today.
Okay, so what causes polarized lights?
The polarized light is how the light
interacts with the your landscape
on the scene that you're photographing.
So, polarization, or polarized light,
is caused by things like pollution,
moisture in the atmosphere,
and on wet or reflective surfaces.
So thinking waterfalls, creeks, lakes,
those kinds of things as well.
So, I thought I'd come out today and talk to you through
how we're going to use a circular polarizer
in forest or woodlands photography.
We had a lot of rain overnight,
so the forest floor and the bush
is actually quite wet, damp,
there's a lot of reflective surfaces.
So that's a good example to show you how,
by using a circular polarizer,
we'll be able to saturate the image
and make those greens really pop
in the ferns and the foliage,
but also reduce the glare on the foliage as well.
So you'll see that in a moment as well.
If you look to social media, Instagram,
those sort of places over the last handful of years.
When you see really highly-saturated image,
apart from moving the saturation slider,
perhaps in Lightroom,
a lot of the times people are using a polarizer,
or a circular polarizer depending on their system
and their kit as well.
And it provides the opportunity to saturate the colors,
make them really pop.
And as I said before,
reduces those reflective surfaces and glare
on things like rocks and leaves.
(relaxing music)
So, I think, for me, having a circular polarizer,
or a polarizer in general,
is one of the most important part of my kit,
I'd recommended it for any landscape photographer.
It's a filter that you just basically need to have
because ultimately, as it stands today,
you cannot replicate that effect in Photoshop, Lightroom,
at this stage anyway,
but who knows what the future might bring,
but right now you can't actually replicate that effect.
So, about having a circular polarizer,
and in my case, in a forest woodland situation,
I may or may not use it
depending on the artistic choice I'm looking at,
or the conditions,
but certainly when it's really wet, and moist and damp
on the forest floor, nine times out of 10,
I'll take an image with both.
So, I'll do one with a circular polarizer on
and one without, just to have a look
when I get back into Lightroom
and have a look at what I think visually looks appealing
and what I'm trying to, I guess,
what sort of image I'm trying to create or compose.
Just a couple things to keep in mind.
So, think of a circular polarizer
is like when you put your sunnies on,
or your sunglasses on.
And the other thing to be aware of
is that obviously by reducing the light
hitting through to your sensor,
it, depending on the circular polarizer,
the system that you're using,
are coming in at between one and one and a half
stops of light.
And so, in the example I'm about to show,
you'll see how the reduction of light,
or the exposure drops,
up between .3 and .7 for my circular polarizer,
depending on the effect, the angle of the sun as well.
So it's really a bit of trial and error,
but just something to be aware of.
(relaxing music)
So, first thing we're going to do is take a photograph
of the scene without the polarizer,
so you can see the effect with and without.
So, as you can see here, frame's up without the polarizer,
so no polarizer on the front of the lens.
So we've got F/8, ISO 800, 120, sorry,
1/25 of a second, we'll take that shot now.
(relaxing music)
Okay, so today I'm using the Sony A7III, as normal,
but I'm also using the Sony 24-105 F4.
So, for this lens, with my filter system, which is by NiSi,
I need to put on a lens ring or filter thread.
So, if you don't what that is,
on the front of your lens,
it should say here, a little, I guess there's a Greek,
I don't actually know what it is,
a symbol and it says 77.
So in the kit we have here, we look for NiSi 77,
which is this ring here.
And then we just put on the front.
And that's just 'cause different lens,
different sizes, for the CPL.
And then we'll grab out the NiSi circular polarizer,
which has it's cap on it
and very easy to install,
literally just twist on the front there like that,
and remove the cap, and we're on.
You can see that the polarizing now being on,
the colors are much more saturated
and the glare has been reduced.
So in the previous photograph we looked at,
we saw that the contrast of the colors,
there's a little bit sheen on them,
I'll show you those photographs on the screen shortly,
but here you can see the greens
are much more saturated in the foreground here,
and the leaves of the eucalypt
are actually looking a little bit more vibrant.
So, we'll take that shot now.
(relaxing music)
So the sun's now 90 degrees to my left,
or left of camera.
So, this is without the polarizer on.
I'm just gonna turn on the front now
and just see those greens in the foreground,
those ferns now much more saturated
and the color separation's are bold.
So, before I share my final thoughts,
I wanted to pass the question off over to you.
Do you have a polarizer?
And, if you do,
what sort of situation do you find it the most useful for?
Leave a comment below.
If you got value out of this video,
give the video a like, I'd really appreciate it,
it really helps.
(relaxing music)
So, a couple of situations where you wouldn't use
a circular polarizer, or a polarizer in general,
things like doing a pano because
the light's changing across the scenes.
So, you need to have an even distribution for your exposure.
Or a situation
where we're taking photographs of a waterfall,
potentially, you do want the reflective surface,
so potentially, you don't want to see the rocks,
so by using the polarized effect, reduces the glare,
and you can see the rocks inside the creek
or the bottom of the waterfall.
But it's really useful for things
that we've talked about today.
So, removing glare off things like ferns,
and rocks, and water surfaces that we're after,
It really helps in terms of making creative decisions.
So, we talked before about whether you want a softer image
or a more highly saturated, you want your images to pop.
Those are the kinds of situations
where you would use a polarizer.
If you're keen to learn more about
forest and woodland photography,
the next video you should definitely watch
is one I filmed in a cool, temperate rainforest
here in Southeastern Australia a few months back.
I'll leave it in the card up here,
and a link in the description below as well.
I'll see you in the next video.