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UltravioletPhotography

Why are FL-D and FL-W filters not labeled consistently across manufacturers?


ultrainfra

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Apologies if this isn't appropriate for this subforum, but it seemed closest to an off topic section.

 

This is a somewhat odd question, but something that has nagged at me for a good while.

 

Why is it that Hoya, Kenko, and Tiffen label their dark purple FL fitlers as FL-W, and the ligher pinkish one as FL-D, while others call the dark purple one the FL-D, etc? Then the FL-D from Opteka is yellowish like a warming filter.

 

Since these were used in film photography originally, would the colors of these not be standard?

 

 

post-328-0-12514000-1605009033.jpg

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I don't know if you can tell by always just looking at them. The 'w' is for warm light and the 'd' is for daylight fluorescent light bulbs.

They are meant to reduce the green cast of film, which we don't have as a general problem anymore with digital cameras.

This is their spectra.

post-188-0-52369300-1605013739.png

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I don't know if you can tell by always just looking at them. The 'w' is for warm light and the 'd' is for daylight fluorescent light bulbs. They are meant to reduce the green cast of film, which we don't have as a general problem anymore with digital cameras. This is their spectra.

 

 

Yeah, I don't really use filters the 'color correction' purpose for which they were originally intended. I enjoy seeing what sorts of effect they have on my full spectrum camera mostly, and experimenting with filter stacks. Sure color corrections can be done with Luminar/Lightroom/Darktable/Gimp/Photoshop/Your Favorite Program Here, but not quite as fun as a hobby.

 

I know the pictures can be misleading online, due to lighting making the hue look different, but if you browse around eBay for example for FL-D and FL-W, you'll see that between some brands the colors are flipped.

 

Then there's the Opteka I mentioned. Here's a photo of mine that came with a filter + wide angle + teleconversion lens set. It's a bit lighter in color than the picture makes it appear. Looks to me (in person) about like an 81B rather than any FL-D filter.

 

post-328-0-60340200-1605043811.jpg

 

Also, Kenko just sent me the transmission curve for their Twilight Blue filter. Looks identical to the FL-W curve you posted. Interesting

 

post-328-0-06454800-1605042442.png

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Actually the plastic FL-D filters that have been throw in with some of my lenses have been my favorite for IR. They turn all green leaves white, but every thing else stays normal.
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Actually the plastic FL-D filters that have been throw in with some of my lenses have been my favorite for IR. They turn all green leaves white, but every thing else stays normal.

That's so interesting! Can you show examples?
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Cadmium my browser gives a warning for that site that says it may be impersonating Hoya...?

 

their ssl certificate expired at end of october, thats their real link. I've been to the site before.

 

Cadmium -- what do you intend to show via the link? I'd guess that the LB80 looks like my opteka FL-D?

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The Hoya made glass versions have various visual colors, and I am assuming other brands do also, and some like the Tiffen are not glass, they are colored internal plastic, and some are entirely plastic.

Like the ones that come as a set: CPL, FLD, ND... often plastic.

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Slightly 'late to the pass' as it were, but I just bought a slightly older Hoya FL-W to measure the transmission on. For the huge sum of 1GBP for the filter I thought it was worth the effort. Here it is.

post-148-0-63558100-1605972045.jpg

 

post-148-0-63925000-1605972178.jpg

 

Looks like a reasonable match to the Hoya data.

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