The Nisi Holders - is an upgrade worth it?

Shape and size of the V6 (blue) compared to the V5-Pro (red) mounted to a Zeiss 18mm on a Nikon D800e

Earlier this year Nisi brought out their latest 100mm square filter holder, the V6. For those who aren’t aware of Nisi, they broke onto the scene a few years ago and completely disrupted the photographic filter market that has for long been dominated by Lee Filters (at least in South Africa, but certainly also in Australia). The original V5-Pro filter holder was fairly unique in that it allowed the use of a special polariser filter that could be screwed into the actual holder adapter, rather than in the front of the holder like the enormous and costly Lee 105mm polariser (see this article on the holder systems compared to each other).

GAS - A Counter Point

It has become popular to ridicule the much copied act of Gear Acquisition Syndrome, or GAS for short. For those who aren’t familiar with the acronym GAS, it refers to the build up of equipment in the never-ending  pursuit for some kind of silver bullet for our photography (where that silver bullet is a piece of equipment). The first part of GAS is the reasoning that every flaw in a photograph is surmised to be a result of the equipment, not the photographer. If the image is out of focus, get a new lens. If the image is blurred, get a new camera, etcetera. The second part of GAS is the insatiable desire to play with new toys and the justification created to buy them. So the thinking goes, “I am starting out in wildlife photography…wildlife requires big lenses…I’ll buy a big lens….oh dear, I’m not getting close enough [to the subject]…I’ll buy another bigger lens”, and so it goes. 

The Nisi Long Exposure Set

There is something quite depressing about the sound that optical glass makes when it breaks. The initial crack, and following tinkle, that you know is the sound of something expensive going ‘bye-bye’. As it was when my trusty Lee ‘Little Stopper’ shattered, while in the pouch might I add (although the pouch isn’t designed to be dropped - albeit accidentally - in quite that way). I personally think that the 6 stop neutral density filter, aka the ‘Little Stopper’ is actually more useful than the better known 10 stop ND filter, the ‘Big Stopper’ and use it frequently enough that I would have to find a replacement. So, I cast about thinking how to replace the smashed filter.

Living (and traveling) with an F-Stop

There is no such thing as the perfect camera bag. Photographers have driven themselves broke in the attempt to find one. Unfortunately, the reality is that the active photographer needs a specific bag for a specific purpose. Bad news for photographers, excellent news for bag manufacturers as they have a captive and desperately seeking market. Over the course of my interest in photography I have had the opportunity to own several types of bags from various manufacturers. On starting out in the mid nineties I, like many other South Africans, had limited choice that was essentially constrained to Tamrac, Tenba and Lowe-Pro. As we entered the noughties finally brands like Domke, Billingham, and ThinkTank became more readily available.