IR filter advice?

Question

I went to 2 so called specilist photography shops today and asked for a IR filter for my dslr camera which is a sony alpha and the first camera shops said they you cant get a IR filter.

The second shop had one but they said "we do not think it will work on digital slr cameras.

If i brought a IR filter would it work on my sony alpha? i think its a 55 size filter my sony takes.

I really want to take photos like the ones found on
http://www.pauck.de/marco/photo/infrared/infrared.html

Please help.

Answer 1

Before you buy an IR filter for your camera, you should check the IR compatibility of your camera which is manufacturer specific. Some camera models are more or less sensitive to the IR spectrum than others and this is mainly due to a filter mounted directly in front of your camera's image sensor. There is a measure of IR to visible light specturm ratio that will determine whether your camera is sensitive enough to capture an IR image with a filter, like the Hoya R72 for example. I think that most camera store salespersons are fairly ignorant to specific camera sensitivity to IR, therefore they wouldn't know in the first place. They no doubt wanted to save face despite their lack of knowledge by suggesting such a filter would not work on your camera. There are many places on the internet where you can obtain information pertaining to manufacturer specific IR sensitivity. You can start with the digtial IR flickr group, I can't recall the specific message board thread pertaining to sensitivity, but you can take some time and read the various discussions on the matter. It's in there, and as with anything involving the achievment of any goal in the art of photography, your learning curve is only dependant on what you are willing to commit to it. Good luck.

Be aware, the photos in the link you provided were shot using infrared film and filter combnation. The images produced by a digital camera will not look the same. You must have a pretty good grasp of photoshop channels editing skills to achieve much of what you see that are IR images produced by a digital camera.

Answer 2

Here is a simple test to find out if your camera has an Infrared (IR) filter in front of the sensor. Take a TV remote, point it at your camera lens and press the Power button on the remote. If you see a red dot on your viewscreen then there is no IR filter in front of your sensor. No red dot and there is an IR filter present.

You can have the IR filter removed but then your camera will be IR-only with an IR filter like the Hoya R72.

Of course, you could buy an IR-only DSLR like the Fujifilm FinePix S3 PRO UVIR.

Visit shutterbug.com and Search for "The Digital Road to IR" which was in the Feb. 2006 issue of Shutterbug Magazine. Actually, if you do a Search for "digital infrared" you'll find several articles.

Answer 3

There is a quick and easy way to test if your camera can do IR pictures. Pick up a TV remote and point it at your camera, while pushing any button on it. While holding the button, take a picture of the end of the remote with the digital camera you want to test. Then check the picture. Do you see the light? If you don't see it at all, then don't bother getting an IR filter. If you see it slightly, it might work, and it's up to you if you want to buy the filter. They can get expensive. If you see it really well, then you can go ahead and get the filter and use it.

You will still need a program like Photoshop to work with the pictures you take with the filter. Otherwise, you will just get deep red pictures. My favorite way of doing it is to convert to black and white, then use the diffuse glow filter. That way you can get an image that looks similar to the ones you get with IR film.

Answer 4

If you want to pick up IR on a webcam, you must remove the filter that filters out infra red radiation. Not sure if its the same thing but it might be what the second retailer was talking about. Hope you get a better answer from a professional photographer.

Answer 5

IR filters are quite expensive. Try looking on Ebay. (i got my polarising filter on there) Or, get an editing progamme such as corel psp11. That has an ir 'filter' on there. Before you decide what to do, and if you like IR shots, have a look at the 'redbubble' site. The link below takes you to most of thr ir pics. Good luck.
http://www.redbubble.com/search/find/?search%5Bsearch%5D=ir&search%5Bhidden_search%5D=

Answer 6

an ir filter is an ir filter, why not get a good quality ir filter in 55mm size
try hoya filters as a search that should work

Answer 7

You might have to buy a camera designed to see infared, like the Fujifilm S5 Pro UVIR.

Answer 8

Have a read of:

http://dpfwiw.com/ir.htm