Cheap Tiffen filters  (1 of 3)

Here we have a bunch of low price Tiffen UV filters and when I say low price I mean under $10. They aren’t horrible but they aren’t anything to write home about. These filters are what you buy when you want to protect a lens from scratches, dust, and the rest of the damage a lens can be exposed to out in the world. I am not attempting to get into a debate about “good filters verses cheap filters” or “filter verses no filter” I’m simply pointing out that I have no problem using low price filters on my collection of Panasonic GH4 lenses.

Cheap Tiffen filters  (2 of 3)

The reason I bring this up is that normally even very low end filters can be very expensive. Normally it’s not unreasonable to spend 40 dollars, all the way up to $200 on a variable ND filter for a normal size lens. The thing is, most Panasonic GH4 lenses don’t require what would normally be considered a “normal size” filter. Digging through my collection of M43 lenses, the biggest filter size I have is a 62mm on the Olympus 12-40mm f2.8. Every other lens in the collection is 58mm or smaller.

Cheap Tiffen filters  (3 of 3)

As a Canon shooter I generally recommend buying a single variable ND filter based on the largest lens in your collection. Then you can buy a handful of adapter rings for a $1 or 2 a piece so that you can attach the ND filter to smaller lenses in your collection. However, because the GH4 lenses are so small, variable ND filers end up being vary affordable. Don’t get me wrong, these filters aren’t top notch by any means but they are completely usable.

Cheap varible ND filter (1 of 1)

Here’s an example of the $12 variable ND filter on the Voigtlander 17.5mm f0.95 lens (download the raw file here). If you take a look at the raw file, you’ll see that there is very little color tinting and the 16MP image doesn’t exhibit any major effects from the filter.

At this price and size, it’s not unreasonable to own a variable ND fliter for each filter size in your M43 collection. 58mm, 52mm, and 46mm seem to cover most things in my current M43 lens lineup, but at $12 a piece I might even pick up a 37mm for the Olympus 45mm f1.8. I’m really suppressed how reasonable these filters are priced for what they are.

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