welding glass

[damien]

hi i have just recently found out about photograhy using welding glass, this got my mind going and thought well ill try, having tried today i feel a little dishearted because i thought this would be interesting and new topic for myself, the ones i have tried taking have all come out green not the colours i thought they would have done, now if any of you have done this and can point me in the right direction i would appreciate it as i dont want to fail at this,

thanks in advance

p.s using nikon d80 with tamron 10 22 lense

[Dave Humphries]

Hi Damien,

Welding glass just isn't designed for photography - i.e to be spectrally neutral, it is designed just block the UV and bright light from a welder's eyes, so I am not surprised.

If you shoot RAW, you may be able to WB the cast out to some extent.

I'd be interested to see what you achieved, what was the subject and why did you want to block so much light?

Cheers,

[Photon Hacker]

Hello. If I understand correctly you want to use welding glass as a filter; but what is your query (If any)?. Specifically, what do you want to use it for?. If you just want to dim light look for natural density filters.

[Steve S]

hi i have just recently found out about photograhy using welding glass, this got my mind going and thought well ill try, having tried today i feel a little dishearted because i thought this would be interesting and new topic for myself, the ones i have tried taking have all come out green not the colours i thought they would have done, now if any of you have done this and can point me in the right direction i would appreciate it as i dont want to fail at this,

thanks in advance

p.s using nikon d80 with tamron 10 22 lense

Have you tried setting a custom whitebalance? Welding glass is tinted and will give a color cast, set a custom wb to get rid of the colorcast.

[damien]

as i was just playing today dave its was just trees near my house, i have seen in photos how they make the water look so still ect if your not sure what im on about in flicker search welding glass and the results what people are getting on there, now thats what i want to achieve, today wasnt probley being the best day to decide to try something like this as it was overcast and horrible hoping the winter sun will make a apperance and soon

[damien]

Have you tried setting a custom whitebalance? Welding glass is tinted and will give a color cast, set a custom wb to get rid of the colorcast.

hi steve im new to all this if im honest, had the camera for about 6 months and just go and play and shoot, now ive got my wide angle lense i wanna head into landscape and try and i do use the word try losely get some real good photos, because im shooting in bulb mode as well i really dont understand i tried it on the k setting in white balance and moved it to highest no, am i right in doing this,

[Photon Hacker]

Damien: I find your English somewhat hard to read. Couldn't you please try to organize your text into coherent sentences?.

It seems like you're saying you don't understand how to make photographs. Well, don't worry; we all have had to learn and you can learn too. You can find plenty of information in the Internet regarding artistic composition and operation of your equipment. Have you already read the tutorials on this site (Linked from the home page)?. You can also find information to improve your English .

The "still" effect you describe for water currents is usually achieved with long shutter speeds. A natural density filter is usually employed to dim the light enough to allow longer exposition times with a suitable focal ratio. A welding glass is an alternative to a natural density filter made specifically for photographic use.

This is a very basic photographic method covered several online tutorials including this one in this web site. I couldn't emphasize enough how important it is to search the information you need in existing resources before relying on forum users. You would have found a comprehensive answer almost immediately if you had looked into the tutorials in this site or queried your favorite search engine; and probably we would have answered another question rather than yours (Whose answer was readily found, as shown above).

[damien]

Damien: I find your English somewhat hard to read. Couldn't you please try to organize your text into coherent sentences?.

It seems like you're saying you don't understand how to make photographs. Well, don't worry; we all have had to learn and you can learn too. You can find plenty of information in the Internet regarding artistic composition and operation of your equipment. Have you already read the tutorials on this site (Linked from the home page)?. You can also find information to improve your English .

The "still" effect you describe for water currents is usually achieved with long shutter speeds. A natural density filter is usually employed to dim the light enough to allow longer exposition times with a suitable focal ratio. A welding glass is an alternative to a natural density filter made specifically for photographic use.

This is a very basic photographic method covered several online tutorials including this one in this web site. I couldn't emphasize enough how important it is to search the information you need in existing resources before relying on forum users. You would have found a comprehensive answer almost immediately if you had looked into the tutorials in this site or queried your favorite search engine; and probably we would have answered another question rather than yours (Whose answer was readily found, as shown above).

i find your comment rather rude, my english is fine as other people understand me, now i have found in the past people on this site helpful untill i came accross you!!!! i know there are sites and links that i can use, however since i came on here last time when i had question and got answerd rather well, people like yourself who are rude make people like me not to bother coming on sites like this!!!! so your telling me how to go and learn english i think you should look at yourself and learn to phrase things better so better wouldnt take offence to it !!!!!!

[Donald]

PM to Damien and Mario re above exchange.

[Colin Southern]

I couldn't emphasize enough how important it is to search the information you need in existing resources before relying on forum users. You would have found a comprehensive answer almost immediately if you had looked into the tutorials in this site or queried your favorite search engine; and probably we would have answered another question rather than yours (Whose answer was readily found, as shown above).

Hi Mario,

Although anyone may indeed get a faster answer to a question by "Googling it first", any and all questions are none-the-less most welcome here regardless, as it may well help others who read it here - or it may well help others who are directed here as the result of a search - and indeed it may well even help those answering the question because it forces us to think more about that aspect of photography and thus gain a better understanding of that aspect or develop better ways of explaining it.

[Colin Southern]

i find your comment rather rude, my english is fine as other people understand me

Hi Damien,

If English isn't a members first language then of course we understand (this is the case for many here, and invariably, their English is far superiour to my Spanish / German / French etc). However, if they're just using "sloppy English" (ie "being lazy") or "TXT speak" then - personally - I do find that somewhat disrespectful to others because it DOES make posts very difficult to read; if that's the best they can do, then fine -- but if they CAN do better (eg "I" instead of "i") then I'm sure that those answering the posts would appreciate it at least as much as the person asking the question will appreciate the answer. And if someone learns some better English in addition to learning better photography here then that can only be a good thing too

[Splatsworth]

I've used welding glass before and some of it is much better than others, its really just a very cheap ND filter at around about 10 stops. The quality of glass varies and you have to bear in mind that you are paying £1.50 for it as compared to the equivelent ND filter which usually start somewhere in the region of £50 and then some. I've never noticed a green cast to any of my pics and as with all of my photography its a lot of Trial and even more error. I can't give much in the way of practical advice as I am still very very much an amateur. but anyone that understands using ND filters should be able to point you in the right direction. My best advice would be to try a different bit of welding glass to see if that helps.

[damien]

I've used welding glass before and some of it is much better than others, its really just a very cheap ND filter at around about 10 stops. The quality of glass varies and you have to bear in mind that you are paying £1.50 for it as compared to the equivelent ND filter which usually start somewhere in the region of £50 and then some. I've never noticed a green cast to any of my pics and as with all of my photography its a lot of Trial and even more error. I can't give much in the way of practical advice as I am still very very much an amateur. but anyone that understands using ND filters should be able to point you in the right direction. My best advice would be to try a different bit of welding glass to see if that helps.

Thank you for you reply, I have 3 diffrent types of welding glass 11 stop, 10 stop, and a 8 stop i started with the 10 stop, im going to try the 8 stop today and hopefully will get somewhere, however the light isnt very good today either so not sure what im going to get, what my main question was how am i going to get rid of it, now Donald said shooting n raw so i can play with the wb more but as i know from the past its all about getting as much right ont he camera as possible, now im like yourself amateur, in fact im probley more like just got the camera from the shop what do i now lol, so what i was trying to get was some helpful tips to look at the camera,

[Colin Southern]

Donald said shooting n raw so i can play with the wb more but as i know from the past its all about getting as much right ont he camera as possible

Getting things right "in camera" is something all good photographers should strive for - but - that doesn't apply to White Balancing because when you shoot RAW, no white balance is (or can be) applied to the RAW file - it's something that had to be done in post-processing. It's one of the few photographic "free lunches"

[JonathanC]

The grading system for welding glass, as I understand it, has no relation to the number of stops. I might be wrong though. I was under the impression that they are just a guide anyway as some 10 glass I have is less tinted than other 10 glass tha gets used.

[Tringa]

Damien, I have also used welding glass and Trev's comment about the quality of this glass in relation to photography is worth bearing in mind. You may be disappointed by the results - I was, but at £1.50 it was worth a go.

Anyway back to the problem that your photos look green. As others have said it is a white balance problem but it is easy to solve.

Put the welding glass on the lens, by whatever method you use when photographing. Switch to Live View and point the camera at a white wall that is brightly and evenly illuminated by sunlight (mid rather than the end of the day). Because of the glass the image of the wall in Live View will look green.

Work through the menus until you find the one to adjust the white balance. I don't know how to do this on your camera but it will be in the manual or someone on here with the same camera will be able to help.

Adjust the white balance until the wall in Live View looks white again. This is the white balance you need to get non-green shots when using the welding glass. I'm guessing your camera will allow you to save this setting as a custom white balance that you can use when you use the glass.

Just remember to move out of this custom white balance setting when you remove the welding glass. The first time I played with welding glass I forgot to do this. Later in the day I grabbed a few quick shots of what looked like the end of a great sunset. While sunsets can be very colourful they are not usually, on this planet, very bright magenta!

Dave

[damien]

Damien, I have also used welding glass and Trev's comment about the quality of this glass in relation to photography is worth bearing in mind. You may be disappointed by the results - I was, but at £1.50 it was worth a go.

Anyway back to the problem that your photos look green. As others have said it is a white balance problem but it is easy to solve.

Put the welding glass on the lens, by whatever method you use when photographing. Switch to Live View and point the camera at a white wall that is brightly and evenly illuminated by sunlight (mid rather than the end of the day). Because of the glass the image of the wall in Live View will look green.

Work through the menus until you find the one to adjust the white balance. I don't know how to do this on your camera but it will be in the manual or someone on here with the same camera will be able to help.

Adjust the white balance until the wall in Live View looks white again. This is the white balance you need to get non-green shots when using the welding glass. I'm guessing your camera will allow you to save this setting as a custom white balance that you can use when you use the glass.

Just remember to move out of this custom white balance setting when you remove the welding glass. The first time I played with welding glass I forgot to do this. Later in the day I grabbed a few quick shots of what looked like the end of a great sunset. While sunsets can be very colourful they are not usually, on this planet, very bright magenta!

Dave

Thanks for the info Dave, Thats what i have been after as i have said in past comments im new to the camera lark and would never of thought about the white wall idea, so i do really appreciate the answer you to my problem, I read things on the net and think ill like to do that, but never seem ablt to produce the last product hopefully with your advice this will be possible when the sun decides to make an appearence, As i have said before thank you very much for the info

[Tringa]

No problem.

Hope you get some good results, if so, post them on here.

Dave

[Bobobird]

Never tried this but from comments I read elsewhere people tend to make more black and whites with the results then try to correct for the green cast. Have seen some excellent b&ws done with this "filter".

[Splatsworth]

This gives a pretty good explanation on the whole process

http://diyphotography.net/use-weldin...tops-nd-filter