Use Welder’s Glass as a $1 ND Filter for Long Exposures in Daylight

Want to shoot long exposure photos in bright daylight without having to shell out big bucks on a neutral density (ND) filter? Try using a piece of welder’s glass — the kind that protects your eyes while welding. The 13-minute video above by photographer Mathieu Stern provides a nice overview of this photo hack.

Instead of spending many tens or hundreds of dollars on an ND filter designed for photography, Stern got a piece of welder’s glass for about $1.

He secured the glass to the front of his camera lens using two rubber bands.

This makeshift filter setup instantly makes it possible to shoot 30 second (or longer) exposures in the daytime, blurring movement in your scenes and creating a different look to cityscape and landscape shots. Here are some example photos by Stern, all shot during the day:

The video above also features tips by long-exposure photographer Thibault Roland.