Lee filters - Polyester, Resin, Glass...

[Kermit power]

How much real difference is there from one to the next?

I'd like to get some decent ND and ND grad filters. Lee invariably come highly recommended, but there's a vast difference in price depending on material, looking on sites such as warehouse express.

Does anyone know where I can find comparison shots? The resin filters seem to be 3 times the price of the polyester ones, and the glass ones are twice the price of the resin ones again. I'm using a 450D, and the output will be going onto Flickr and printing out to A4 at most. I'm shooting in RAW, so don't have issues with correcting slight colour casts if they're uniform.

Are the glass filters really six times as good as the polyester ones, or is there a snobbery premium built in?

[CVP]

I invested in the Lee ones ages ago (.3, .6 and .9 NDs plus I bought Mrs CVP the circular polarizer). Yes they are pricey to start with (esp the circ polarizer!) but mine have taken a good load of punishment over about 8-9 years now and are still in good nick.

I made my choice of resin over glass because it means not worrying about them being put squeezed into the pockets or between dividers in my camera bag.

B&W do seem to be at th top of the price range and I'm not sure you could really tell the difference in the image output between that and one through a Lee or the professional grade/size Cokin ones.

For what it's worth I'm happy I went with Lee as I feel the kit has all lasted very well and so over time has provided good value for money even if you get sticker shock at the beginning. I'm still baulking at the cost of the Big Stopper so I can do some really long exposure shots.

Chris

[Kermit power]

I'd seen the resin and glass ones before, but not the polyester ones. Are these new?

[CVP]

Honestly not sure. I think when I bought they were only doing the resin ones for Lee in terms of photographic filters. The polyester ones they had came as an output from their stage lighting business and I read a while ago are a lot thinner and easier to scratch than the resin ones.

[Elderly]

Kermit power said:

I'd seen the resin and glass ones before, but not the polyester ones. Are these new?

I used Lee polyester colour correction filters (olde worlde film days) for more years than I can remember.
They were much tougher than the Kodak Wratten Gels.
They fitted very well into the Nikon filter holders and various medium format filter holders I used.
They were inexpensive enough to replace if/when they got marked or scratched.

As far as IQ went they were probably on a par with resin but I was using them in static settings where I had time
and ability to ensure that NO extraneous light hit them them.
In less controllable conditions I'm sure that a good glass (coated) filter would be worth the extra expense
in terms of IQ degradation due to flare.

Edited by Elderly on Tuesday 11th January 18:52