Multicoated vs Coated vs Ultra Thin Filters

digismile

With the purchase of a new wide angle this summer, I am currently looking at adding a 77mm circular polarizer. In the 2 brands I can get locally (B&W and Hoya), I can get several different flavours: regular coated, multicoated, and ultrathin (read:expensive, sell the dog expensive, mortgage the house expensive ...:D )

The salesguy who sold me all my other gear said I should go ultrathin, because I wouldn't be happy with the vignetting on the cheaper filters. Before I shell out a couple hundred bucks or send my dog to a new home (just kidding!), what are other people's experience on the different quality filters?

Thanks,
Brad

mercphoto

Mc

digismile wrote:

With the purchase of a new wide angle this summer, I am currently looking at adding a 77mm circular polarizer. In the 2 brands I can get locally (B&W and Hoya), I can get several different flavours: regular coated, multicoated, and ultrathin

I don't know about ultrathin, but I know that multicoating is definitely better than one-side coating. Glass will reflect from either surface and the coatings are combating that.

Also, since the speed of light within glass is different than that of in air the glass will difract the path of light (this is exactly why lenses work in the first place). Given that, a thinner glass will difract less. Whether that difference is noticeable in a photo or not I could not tell you.

Xney

I would say it depends on what quality your lenses are. If you're using expensive glass like 'L' Canon lenses, you want a very good filter that will barely touch the image. If you're using consumer or mid-level zooms, I wouldn't spend $50 on a filter for a $200 lens

If you have $1,200 70-200mm 2.8L IS Canon, you want the good filter so the image is just about the same as it would be without it in terms of quality.

After you buy the filter, you might want to try a few shots with filter on, filter off (on a tripod with manual settings so they're the same).

-Karl