Breaking Waves

Dan Mold shows you how polarizing filters cut out waves of scattered light, giving you clearer pictures, with more contrast and bluer skies

- Dan Mold

One of the reasons you’ll often hear photographers rave about polarizing filters is that they create an in-camera effect that’s near impossible to replicate in post. They can cut down the amount of scattered light in your pictures, giving skies an intense dark blue hue as well as being able to cut through reflections in water and glass – removing them from the picture and giving you a glare-free shots.

However, there’s a few techniques you can employ to make sure you get the best results from your polarizing filter. Here, we’re going to run through our top tips that will help you get started.

The first thing to note is you’ll want a circular polarizing filter, also called a CPL. Circular doesn’t refer to it’s shape, though you can get round ‘screw-in’ type filters at affordable prices, but note that circular polarizers can also be picked up with a square shape for drop-in filter holders. Circular refers to the pattern on the filter responsible for blocking out the scattered light and is the preferred polarising filter when compared to those with a linear pattern, which are have a tendency to interfere with the complex autofocus systems on DSLR cameras.