Formatt Hitech Firecrest 100mm Holder MKII kit
● £165 ● www.formatt-hitech.com
FORMATT Hitech quietly updated its Firecrest 100mm filter holder in 2021, drawing on design elements of its 85mm system. The new version employs a larger-diameter polariser, at 86mm rather than 82mm, to minimise the risk of vignetting. It also gains an improved, lockable mounting clip and a larger, more accessible dial for adjusting the polariser. The firm’s unique shrouds for eliminating light leakage when stacking ND filters have also been redesigned.
The system comes with 86mm and 82mm lens adapter rings, along with step-up rings for 77mm and 72mm threads. The ultra-slim polariser screws onto the lens adapter ring conventionally, which gives rise to the system’s biggest irritation: it’s really awkward to swap out in the field. The tiny, ridged grip around the polariser’s circumference provides barely any purchase, so the key is not to screw it in too tightly.
Aside from that, though, the kit works well. The holder clips easily onto the lens ring and can be locked down at any angle using a large blue anodised knob. There’s a foam seal surrounding the polariser, which means that ND filters don’t need to have one fitted. By using the supplied shrouds, you can also stack two ND filters for greater effect, with no risk of light reflecting between them and degrading image quality. Two pairs of shrouds are supplied, one fully enclosed and the other with slots for GND filters.
The holder comes with slots for two filters installed, and in this configuration, it won’t vignette with lenses as wide as 15mm. It’s also supplied with the parts to fit a third slot if necessary. This is a simple operation that only takes a few minutes, but I’d avoid doing it in the field as it would be all too easy to lose a screw. Also, with a third slot in place, you can no longer use those light-blocking shrouds.
Formatt Hitech supplies the holder kit in a nylon pouch, but there’s no means of attaching it to anything, so you’ll need to find space inside your camera bag. Its Firecrest 100mm filters come in sturdy padded pouches, but these are bulky and can end up taking up a lot of space.
Verdict
Formatt Hitech’s Firecrest MKII system is, all told, a wellconsidered update, and it’s uniquely good for shooting very long exposures with stacked NDs. It’s only let down by its fiddly screw-in polariser.