Grad filters: 'C' type and 'P' type

[911newbie]

Can anyone explain the difference between the 'P' type (are they square ?) and the 'C' type ?
Which is best/cheapest/easiest/most flexible ?

Is it worth buying a couple of cheap filters to try out a bit of lansdscape, or should I just stick to managing exposure differnces as best I can via camera/software settings ?

Cheers
Chris

[Scho]

think the c ones are smaller?

i'b consider lee filters instead.

optically the cokin ones aren't that great.

[GetCarter]

People laugh at me cos I still use grad filters (Actually they probably laugh at me for a lot of other resons, but that's another story) but 90% of my landscapes are taken with a Lee .6 hard. You can clearly see it here:



..and that could easilly be done after in PS

... but here:



... Even with bracketing and the grad I still only JUST managed to hold the highlights in the sky (well nearly). No amount of PS would have helped me in post processing without bracketing and a grad.

They are also really useful to keep the sky roughly the same exposure as a reflection:



and of course you can tilt them to any angle - this at about 30 degrees to port to hold the cloud:



I'd suggest Cokins are worth a try, see how you get on. If you like the results, sell then on E Bay and buy some Lee (which are silly money but much better).

Steve

Edited by GetCarter on Friday 6th June 12:04

[dhutch]

Very nice photographs.

[stigmundfreud]

i love using nd and they do make things a lot easier, typically 2 stops diff between sky ground so expose on sky +2ev and you get a nice balance