Great Camera Lens Filters for Landscape Photography

I've been using filters for my photography for more than ten years, and for the last five, I have used filters made by Kase. Just recently, I switched my filter system to what I think is the perfect filter kit for landscape and architecture photography. In this article, you'll find a detailed review of it.

A few years ago, if you had asked me which filters to get for landscape photography, I'd have answered: The Kase K9 Kit with a set of ND and GND filters. GND filters have always been essential in my photography, but since I switched to the Canon EOS R5 three years ago, I find myself using those less and less.

They still make capturing high-dynamic range scenes easier than relying solely on exposure bracketing. For many years, I would combine both techniques. But the dynamic range modern cameras can capture already gives a good starting point in most situations, so I no longer need GND filters that often.

Kase KW Revolution Professional ND Kit

It is why I decided to switch to a more compact filter kit. Especially during my travels, the GND filters took up too much space in my camera bag. With the Kase KW Revolution Kit, I could reduce the footprint of my filters.

As you already learned in this FStoppers article, this set of color-coded magnetic filters contains a polarizer, an ND8, an ND64, and an ND1000 filter. Included are also two adapters: a normal screw-in magnetic adapter and a tiny inlaid ring that vanishes inside your lens' filter thread. The filters magnetically snap into either of those adapters. The magnets are strong enough for combining several filters, as you can see in the feature video. And while it's possible to use your regular lens cap with these filters, you can also use the included magnetic filter cap.

Image Quality

The magnetic KW Revolution Filters use high-quality Wolverine glass as the filters I used with the K9 Kit. Those were already great, with nearly no color cast and excellent sharpness. But once I got the Revolution filters, I did some additional tests, stacking up to three filters in front of my Canon RF 100-500mm lens while shooting at 500mm.

Note that in the side by side comparisons below, moving the slider to the left will always reveal the photo with the Kase filters attached.

Sharpness

With low-quality filters, you will notice a degradation in detail and sharpness, especially when shooting with a long lens. But as you can see in the 100% crop comparison below, even with two filters - a polarizer and an ND8 - there is no noticeable degradation in image quality. Only when I used three filters, a UV, a polarizer, and an ND64, could I see a minimal reduction in sharpness. I show this comparison in the feature video.

Color Cast

The filters show close to no color cast. In the comparison above, you see a slight warming through the polarizer. It comes mainly from the polarization and the removal of the reflections of the blue sky. It will hardly be a problem, especially if you're shooting raw. 

I also tested the ND1000 filter. See the comparison above. Here, I don't notice any color cast. As you can see in the following comparison, using a UV and an ND8 also produces no color cast. 

Lens Flares

The weather here in Germany hasn't been good since I got the filters. I haven't yet taken a photo with the sun in the frame. But I did a little night photo test shoot in my garden to check how the filters influence the capturing of artificial lights in a photo. What you might notice with low-quality filters when shooting cityscapes at night are little lens flares around the city lights.

Thankfully, such lens flares are well-controlled with the KW Revolution filters. The two photos look identical. I used a magnetic UV filter from Kase with the ND8 from the Revolution Kit for this test. You will also not notice any color cast.

Vignetting

The vignetting topic is a bit more complicated because it depends a lot on the lens you're using and at which focal length you are photographing. I use a Canon RF 15-35mm lens with an 82mm filter thread. But I still got the 95mm Kase KW Revolution Kit. With these larger filters, I can stack two filters even when shooting at 15mm without vignetting. On the Kase Germany homepage, I found a table with recommended filter sizes for different lenses.

When getting a filter set that is larger than the filter thread of your lens, you also need another adapter. Kase offers different step-up rings. I got an 82-95mm adapter and a 77-95mm adapter for the two lenses I use. It also means I cannot use the small inlaid adapters, which is fine but something to consider.

Use Cases

You can join me in the feature video as I show how I use the filters for woodland and river photography. It's the perfect use case for the KW Revolution polarizer and typically also for the ND8. On this day, it was already quite dark in the forest, and I didn't need an ND filter. 

The ND filters will be important at the coast. They let you achieve longer exposure times even before sunset to capture a sense of movement in the water. 

I'd call the ND1000 the fine art filter. You can use it to completely smooth out water and movement to create minimalistic photos. Or you can use it to remove people from a city. If there are just a few people moving through the frame, they vanish in such a long exposure. For crowds, you can achieve a ghost-like effect.

Conclusion

The Kase KW Revolution Pro filters are great for landscape and architecture photography. They are all I need for nearly all my photo shoots. In some situations, I would still like to have a GND filter at hand. But unlike a polarizer or an ND filter, a GND is no longer a necessity for me. You should also decide if that's the case for you. If you still find yourself using GND filters a lot, then switching to this more compact kit might not be the right move and the K9 Kit might be a better option. But when it comes to ease of use and size of the filters, the KW Revolution filters are hard to beat.