Neutral Density Filters in a Digital Age

In a time of Lightroom Presets, Photoshop Plug-ins and more apps that you toss a stick at, one of the most useful on-camera filters is the Neutral Density aka ND filter. If you want to blur moving water and can’t select a slow enough ISO speed, ND filters allow you to use slow enough shutter speeds to photograph waterfalls or a river flowing over rocks. Neutral density filters absorb light evenly throughout the entire visible spectrum, altering exposure without causing a color shift and are available in different densities of gray and are rated by how many f-stops they decrease your aperture settings.

Then there are also variable neutral density filters that are available to accomplish different effects, depending on the kind of photography that you do but some variable ND filters can be difficult to work with wide-angle lenses. Fotodiox (foto-dee-ox) has an interesting product—Fotodiox’s ND Throttle—that’s available for Sony mirrorless cameras and solved the wide-angle ND dilemma.

Do you shoot other kinds of mirrorless cameras? I’ve talked with Fotodiox and expressed my interest them offering one for Micro Four-thirds system cameras and since Fotodiox already makes some great adapters for these cameras, let’s hope that an ND Throttle is the new product pipeline.—Joe Farace