Lee Filters Sunset Series: A Review

Lee Filters makes a sunset series of colored grad filters that come in grad yellow, grad orange, and grad red. The purpose of these filters is to emphasize sunsets or change the color of the sky. They are best used by landscape photographers with a grad neutral density, though I personally don't find that to always be necessary. In order to test the quality of the filters, I compared them to the ones I made myself, and in the case of the red and orange, Lee was superior, but I don't like the yellow and would rather use my own. Given the three colors in the "set" I think they are well-made, though it is slightly irksome that the effects are not consistent between the three colors. The photograph below was taken with my hand-made grad yellow filter, and was used as the photo by which to compare the rest of the images:

My home-made grad-yellow filter in my Lee holder, and the image used as a comparison photograph (c) 2012 J. Rae Chipera all rights reserved.  Photograph taken in San Gregorio, California.

The grad yellow seems to be great at amplifying yellows, but does not change the rest of the sky like the orange and red grad filters do, or like the one I made myself does. There is more teal in this photo than there was in real life, but the filter just did not do a great job changing the color like mine did (although, the sky looks pretty awesome anyway). The following photograph shows my complaint about the grad yellow filter:

Lee Filters grad yellow filter - (c) 2012 J. Rae Chipera all rights reserved. Licensing for use is available for this image - photograph taken in San Diego, California

The red has a great match to the color clouds turn during pink hour - and the orange is great for emphasizing the orange in the sunsets. It's also great that the grad color filters do not seem to make the exposure darker (unless used with a grad nd) with their use. Depending on the lighting there may be a stop difference at most, but for the most part the exposure is the same with or without the grad color filter.

Lee Filters grad red filter used with a 9 stop GND filter - (c) 2012 J. Rae Chipera all rights reserved - licensing for use is available for this image - Photograph taken in San Gregorio, California.

Lee Filters grad orange filter used alone (c) 2012 J. Rae Chipera all rights reserved. Licensing for use available for this image - Photograph taken near the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Preserve in Oklahoma.

I find that the red and orange do a great job creating silhouettes. In the windmills photo you see no seam from the filter across the hills and windmills. They also seem to do great to create different off-colors by changing the white balance in camera. When I use the red filter with a blue-tinted white balance, for example, I can make the red slightly more purple (though the part not in the filter comes out blue).

They have been serving me very well for my Otherworldly's series. The red and orange particularly give me some outstanding effects. However, if I were to make / sell a "set" of sunset filters I would include more than three colors (even if it meant charging more money) as there are more than three colors in a sunset. For example - it would be great to have a grad-blue filter! If you're facing east during a sunset you will also notice other colors depending on where you live.


I've preached my complaints about the Lee holder before, but I will again state that - especially for sunsets - it would be nice to have a third slot for the amount of extra money you pay for a product with the Lee name on it. - In case one wants to use two grad colors and one grad ND or something. I cannot count the number of times I've wanted a grad orange with grad nd on the bottom with a grad yellow on the top - but there are not enough slots to make that photograph happen.

Lee Filters: A Short Review

LEE FILTERS - to join the list of people waiting for theirs from back order..... or to settle for something else?? Disclaimer: I am not being paid by ANYONE to put out this mini review.

Most people want Lee Filters, but get frustrated because they're on back order. You can add your name to the list of people waiting for theirs to come. I have managed to get my hands on their 3, 6, 9 ND set as well as their 3, 6, 9 GND set, the square full red, and the sunset set (half red, half orange, and half yellow.) I also have a Tamron half red and a Tamron half blue. In addition, I have a whole bunch of home-made filters, but that's another post worth of information.

While using a filter, I can indeed produce a SOOC image that is (from my perspective) better than the one I could produce with layers in photoshop with no filter use. I also find that to properly use LEE filters, one needs to know how to use the white balance on their camera to better amplify the effect of the filters (or you can do it in photoshop, but that doesn't typically turn out as nice). What I'm saying is that when you use filters, you're better off NOT shooting on AWB.

Lee is the top-of-the-line company, but if you don't want to wait or don't want to pay that much (remember that a British Pound is currently $1.55) here are some you could substitute as kits: HiTech, SinghRay, Tamron. Don't substitute Hoya or Cokin. Honestly I think my Hoya is best used as a Frisbee. Cokin only produces graduated color filters, and there is a big difference between that and a graduated gray filter. I can't speak about their quality, as I don't use their products.

Things I like about LEE: they are very compatible with my light meter. Some others I have borrowed have done wacky things to the light meter that make it annoying to shoot - you basically have to guess and check on exposure until you get a feel for whether it sits at +2 or -2. 

Like all filters, Lee's products are not scratch proof. However, they come in a great cloth case and cardboard box. You can buy their filter pouch for like $7 and that's well worth the price as well. The square ND filters are best kept in the cardboard box. Don't screw up that box!

I don't have much negative to say about the filters except I wish they weren't so hard to obtain.

I will also say that the LEE grad colors out-perform my Tamron grad filters. However, if I tweek my white balance, I can achieve the same result with the Tamron product as I could with the Lee's.

About my LEE Holder

It is larger than other companies' holders, which is very convenient. It holds larger filters (4"x6"), and is great construction. I love the quick release! I can take it off the 77mm (filter size) ring and put it on the 82mm easily and quickly. It's also drop proof by the way.

I wish the attachment (the part that the quick release releases from) screwed onto the lens like either a lens cover or filter does. It's kind of a pain in the neck to attach to my lens quite honestly. It's so much of a pain that I wish I could just leave it permanently on my lens - but if I leave it on and release the holder, I have to take it off to use a lens hood or a filter. It's more than a little annoying, and I have seen better schematics on my friends' cameras.

I wish it had a slot for three filters instead of two (they make a part you can add on, but it's always sold out so if you want to use three filters and have one stay tuned as I am making something and will blog about it once it works the way I need). I find myself sometimes hoping I could use 2 grad colors and an ND but I can't because there are not enough slots to hold them. If someone can find me a 3 slot LEE holder I'd sell my 2 slot holder.

I wish there were a way to use the LEE holder with a circular polarizer on the lens. They sell a "circular polarizer front mount thread" but is back ordered (of course.) I am going to attempt to make one of those as well from a step-up ring.