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EX1/EX3 IR Filter Shoot-Out

The EX1/EX3 built-in Hot Mirrors suck. Or do they? One way to find out...

By Art Adams | February 26, 2009

THIRD UP: TIFFEN



The only Tiffen filter we tried was the Tiffen Hot Mirror IR ND 1.2:





It worked perfectly. This should have been a clue, but I didn't see its relevance until I was driving away. And then I felt like an idiot.

I was so stuck on the idea that this camera's built-in Hot Mirror was poor or missing that I missed all the clues:

The Schneider Tru-Cut 680 worked fine except for vignetting.


The Schneider Tru-Cut 720 and Formatt Hot Mirrors removed some of the IR/far red contamination, but not all.


The Schneider Tru-Cut 750 did nothing.


The Tiffen Hot Mirror IR ND filters worked perfectly.


I was halfway home before it hit me: the problem wasn't that the cameras had poor built-in Hot Mirrors, and the problem probably wasn't infrared at all. I'd seen exactly the same pattern on the Sony F35. The issue on that camera hadn't been solved by a Hot Mirror at all, but by a dye filter that only blocked far red. That dye component is built into the Tiffen Hot Mirror IR ND filters, but as I hadn't tested the Tiffen IR ND filters that DON'T contain a Hot Mirror component I had no idea whether the issue was IR (solved by a Hot Mirror) or far red (solved by a simpler, and cheaper, dye filter).

Could it be that this little $10k camera had the same issue as its $250k big brother? At the next opportunity, while prepping for a spec spot, I performed a quick check with the Tiffen IR ND (non-Hot Mirror) filters. The final results are on the next page...

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Comments

Art Adams: | March, 14, 2009

I don’t know that they are commercially available. I got one to test when Schneider first brought IR filters on the market but I think the only one they’ve officially released is the Tru-Cut 750, which works great on the RED.

You should give them a call. They’re about the nicest people you’d ever hope to do business with.

Michael B. McGee: | March, 14, 2009

Thanks Art.  yeah,i’ve gotta EX1.  i second that about Scheider.  I see many of their reps through the year.  very nice people.  i’ll call them monday.

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