Should one use a polariser at night ?

[darkavgr]

Is it useful at night to use a circular polariser ?
Will it cut out reflections ?
Will it saturate colours ?
esp for general people shots with flash....

sometimes I tend to leave the polariser on as lens protector..
is this a good practice ?

thanks..dark

 

[maddog]

I leave a UV lens to protect my lens. Polarizer at night will cause you to lower your shutter speed. For a digital camera this will mean more noise in your shot.

 

[Kazu]

Originally posted by darkavgr
Is it useful at night to use a circular polariser ?
Will it cut out reflections ?
Will it saturate colours ?
esp for general people shots with flash....

sometimes I tend to leave the polariser on as lens protector..
is this a good practice ?

thanks..dark

I use porlariser for some nite shots

www.pbase.com/kazu/night_shooting

 

[Tweek]

Originally posted by darkavgr
Is it useful at night to use a circular polariser ?
Will it cut out reflections ?
Will it saturate colours ?
esp for general people shots with flash....

sometimes I tend to leave the polariser on as lens protector..
is this a good practice ?

cut out reflections, it will. Saturate colours, I doubt it will be significant. It is generally not recommended to leave polariser as a lens protector, as it reduces light by 1-2 stops, and an additional piece of glass means some degradation in image quality.

 

[ckiang]

For night shots, less filters = less flare = better. Polarizers generally don't have much effect at night.

Regards
CK

 

[megaweb]

sometimes I do use Grad ND filter for nite shots ...

not polariser .. seem useless to me

 

[jasonpgc]

As a guide, use filters only when you think you need to do so.

If there is any reflection that you think its is necessary to remove from the picture, who cares whether it is night or day, go ahead use the CPL.

If you think a CPL works better than an UV as a protection filter, if you think its more convenient or the resulting picture suits your taste better, go ahead and use it, why not?

BTW CPL will have little or no effect at all for "On_Camera" flash. However CPL can be exceptionally useful for shooting through Shop floor windows or the Airport Viewing Gallery in the night.