A graduated neutral density filter can be extremely useful when taking photographs. It can go a LONG way to improving photographs of a bright sky with a medium foreground. Without this if you set your camera for a properly exposed sky the foreground will be too dark and if you expose for a properly exposed foreground the sky is all washed out with no detail. With a graduated neutral density filter like this one, though, you can rotate the dark part of your filter to cover the sky and leave the clear part on the foreground. When you set your exposure for the foreground the darker neutral density top part of the filter tones down the sky so it appears properly exposed, too. It's a fantastic addition to the filters you need for a lot of outdoor photography. The 0.6 rating of this filter means the darkest part of the filter reduces the amount of light transmission by two stops. It graduates from 0.6 to clear.

I'm not a photo lab or professional photographer so I didn't do a qualitative analysis of this particular filter against other graduated neutral density filters from manufacturers such as Heliopan, Cokin, Nikon, Leica, Hoya or others, so I can't say how it compares against other 0.6 graduated filters or against other graduated filters with higher or lower density. I can say, however, that I'm satisfied with the performance of this Tiffen filter. It's a glass filter which puts it a cut above plastic filters. It has a black aluminum frame which makes it sturdy and the black finish won't cast reflections or glare on the filter glass. It's not multi-coated. Multi-coated filters are recommended for digital photography because they eliminate problems with reflection and glare on the filter glass which can end up in the image and ruin the image. Apparently this is much more likely to occur with digital images than with film or slides. I haven't had any of those problems with this filter yet, though. It's easy to use and so far has produced clear nicely exposed images with my digicam for the recreational amateur photography I do. There are certainly higher priced graduated ND filters out there and if you're shooting professional photos with a high-end DSLR camera you'll probably want to choose a higher-end multi-coated filter. For recreational amateur photography, though, this filter adequately meets my needs.
A graduated neutral density filter can be extremely useful when taking photographs. It can go a LONG way to improving photographs of a bright sky with a medium foreground. Without this if you set your camera for a properly exposed sky the foreground will be too dark and if you expose for a properly exposed foreground the sky is all washed out with no detail. With a graduated neutral density filter like this one, though, you can rotate the dark part of your filter to cover the sky and leave the clear part on the foreground. When you set your exposure for the foreground the darker neutral density top part of the filter tones down the sky so it appears properly exposed, too. It's a fantastic addition to the filters you need for a lot of outdoor photography. The 0. 6 rating of this filter means the darkest part of the filter reduces the amount of light transmission by two stops. It graduates from 0. 6 to clear. I'm not a photo lab or professional photographer so I didn't do a qualitative analysis of this particular filter against other graduated neutral density filters from manufacturers such as Heliopan, Cokin, Nikon, Leica, Hoya or others, so I can't say how it compares against other 0. 6 graduated filters or against other graduated filters with higher or lower density. I can say, however, that I'm satisfied with the performance of this Tiffen filter. It's a glass filter which puts it a cut above plastic filters. It has a black aluminum frame which makes it sturdy and the black finish won't cast reflections or glare on the filter glass. It's not multi-coated. Multi-coated filters are recommended for digital photography because they eliminate problems with reflection and glare on the filter glass which can end up in the image and ruin the image. Apparently this is much more likely to occur with digital images than with film or slides. I haven't had any of those problems with this filter yet, though. It's easy to use and so far has produced clear nicely exposed images with my digicam for the recreational amateur photography I do. There are certainly higher priced graduated ND filters out there and if you're shooting professional photos with a high-end DSLR camera you'll probably want to choose a higher-end multi-coated filter. For recreational amateur photography, though, this filter adequately meets my needs.