In Febuary 2010, Hitech announced a line of "Neutral Density Reverse Graduated" filters. Reverse Graduated filters were originally developed by American filter manufacturer Singh Ray in association with photographer Daryl Benson. Like standard ND grad filters, the bottom half of the filter is clear, having no effect on your image and the top has a neutral density coating, reducing light transmission.

Where the two filter types differ is the graduation its self; reverse grads have a hard transition from clear to ND, but then slowly fade back to almost clear at the top.
Primarily designed for use at sunrise and sunset, when the sun if on horizon. The denser middle area of the filter holds back the super bright area on and just above the horizon, whilst the slow graduation back to a lower density at the top stops overly darkening the sky, helping to retain finer details higher in the scene.

I'd been looking into getting a reverse grad for a while but at £120 [minus shipping and tax] each from the US, I decided to wait, hoping for a British manufacturer to jump on the band wagon. Luckily, Hitech were quick off the mark and go working on their own version.

I've been using one since June 2010. Here's my thoughts and experiences with my 0.9 Hitech Reverse Grad.

A few years back, a bunch of photographers started experimenting with high density ND filters, designed for photographing bright industrial processes like welding and furnaces, to achieve super-long exposures in broad daylight.
The technique soon caught on and demands for the filters sky rocketed. The main player in the high density ND game was German company B+W. Their screw-in 3.0 ND became as ridiculously hard to get in 77mm (the size most wide-angle lens filter rings are) with waiting lists of months at most suppliers.
The main downside of the screw-in B+W was the difficulty using ND grad filters with it; having to screw the filter in an align grads against a black viewfinder. Live View on some camera models could compensate but it added an extra degree of hassle.

In March 2010, Lee Filters released the Big Stopper, their entry into the 10-stop ring. Unlike the B+W, the Big Stopper was designed to use Lee's 100mm slot-in filter system, enabling the user to align their grad filters and then slot in the high-density filter after. Waiting lists became ridiculous, 3-4 months at most UK suppliers, Lee couldn't keep up with the immense demand the new filter generated.

When the reviews started appearing online, the general reception was outstanding, further fuelling demand for the filter.

I've had mine for a few months now; here are my thoughts on it...

Good evening readers,
I trust you're all well?

Well, as some of you may know, I'm working on a book at the moment, a fieldguide to shooting landscapes.
Its going to cover the essential gear, technique, settings and maybe a bit of post processing, and is aimed mostly at those relatively new to landscape photography and photography in general.

My question to you guys is what would you like to see included?
Nothing is too basic or "stupid". If you'd like to learn about it, I'd like to hear it.

Either drop me an email through the site or leave a comment at the end of this post.

Thanks for reading.

Matt.

So I get asked a lot of questions about filters, how they work, what to get, why this does that. So heres my run down on filters...

Theres two main types of filter: Screw-ins and Slot-ins.
Most of you will be familiar with the screw-in type, as I hope you all have UV/Skylight filters on the front of your lenses! [Cheaper to replace one of them than a whole lens, remember]
The slot-in is a more exotic type.

You can get most types of filter in both screw in and slot in, but if you have a variety of lenses with different filter ring sizes, buying one filter of each size can become costly rapidly.
I favour the slot-in type. I have screw in UV filters on all my lenses, but ontop of that I always have a slot-in filter holders attachment ring.

Slot-in filters seem [very] costly to begin with, and sometimes rather complicated. But you need to weigh up the price of the initial start up cost and filters, versus buying the same filter for each of your lenses.