H&Y Recently announced a new addition to its lineup of magnetic and heat-interchangeable filter accessories: Rivering Swift. The company says it is the world’s first modular magnetic filter system and it was launched Kickstarter Where, at the time of publication, it has already achieved almost ten times the initial funding target.
The company says it listened to users at the first launch and developed and adapted the product line to do exactly what creative photographers and videographers wanted: a complete ecosystem for stacking magnetic filters that can be quickly and easily changed or switched without multiple cameras. Need for step up ring.
The new Swift system is designed entirely around a reversing mount that uses an attractive mechanism to attach itself to your lenses by extending and retracting your lens filter threads. Once in place, the system is fairly locked, and from there you can mix, match, and add drop-in filters and magnetic boxes / adapters to accommodate the type of shot you’re going for. The system supports square filters and mounts, drop-in circular filters and adapters, matbox and barn doors and even a simple magnetic lens caps to protect your lenses when shot and transported.
The system has static step-up rings available if you prefer, but the reversing adapters come in sizes up to 37-49mm, 46-62mm, 58-77mm, 67-82mm, and 82-95mm which should effectively accommodate most lenses on the market. If you want to use static step-up rings, they are sad No. Magnetic
Riverside Swift is considered such a big deal just for the sake of convenience. Traditionally, if you want to stack something creative like an ND filter, a CPL, and a streak / flare / or color filter, you’ll need to remove the entire system from your lens to connect and delete each part, which can be time consuming. Damaged, clunky, even problematic while off the field. The Swift system changes the game in this case, making it incredibly quick and easy to swap and pile creative filters in the studio or off the field.
Design and build quality
Like most filter systems, wrapping your head around the supply of the entire system can be a bit overwhelming at first. But after spending some time with the options they all started to make a lot of money.
At its core, you can start with a blank reversing magnetic base adapter or one loaded with a CPL and / or VND system. At first, the reversing mount may feel a bit stiff and clever to extend and securely mount. And to be fair, I can see how some users will be concerned that this gripping system for mounting can scratch the surface of a lens which can cause potential damage, but it can happen to almost anything you mount on the lens, so just your time. Take and be careful until the system becomes second nature.
Adapter Build Quality (and Accessories) The high-end systems I’ve used – including LEE filters and PolarPro – have been around for years, and they feature an all-metal design that’s very solid and durable. I realized that I was more likely to damage my table and camera gear before I damaged the filter mounts and adapters because they were too stiff. Regardless of which base adapter is mounted, you can then shoot as it is, or start adding a combination of different magnetic holders and filters of your choice.
Drop-in kits can be snaped into place without worrying about light leaks and depending on the added filter, a metal rotating ring on the side is easy to access and adjust. In the photo above, I added two filters but you can stack as many or as few filters as you want, and again, it was incredibly fast and easy to do.
Additionally, other kit components – such as square filters, rubber lens hoods, matte boxes and even magnetic lens caps – are all incredibly easy to replace, strong and durable and the magnets feel incredibly strong. At home, I was worried that the magnets would not hold against the wind or even when mounting the weight of the filters, but those worries quickly faded away when I started using it in the field. With larger square filters, holders even come up with a screw-locking mechanism to hold the filter tightly for an extra level of security. This also ensures that there is no “flow” of filters when you push or push the system.
The magnets snap together so well that it occasionally pinches my fingers, so if you’re wearing gloves, adding different filters will make it much easier to stick them out.
From a video standpoint, if you do live recordings and want to add, remove or adjust filters, the camera will easily pick up the sound they make. These include CPLs, VNDs, and adjustable creative filters that have a rotating wheel. Although a very minor issue, such as normal compatibility before recording, potential users should be aware that these filters are not completely silent in operation.
Each kit comes with a carry case or pouch that helps protect the components from dust, dirt, scratches and straightening when not in use. These mini-bags were quite effective, but with so many components, it took almost a dedicated gear bag to carry them all together. The good news is, like most filter companies, they have an optional “Luxury” filter bag An easy access kit that fits most of the camera bag for easy travel fits most of the finer components.
Usability and performance
There’s a lot to unpack here so I’ll try to contain it by material. Looking through the CPL and VND built-in adapter rings, it’s incredibly quick and easy to mount on the lens, and adjusting to the neutral density level (or polarizer) is quick and smooth, but very easy to do. While tweaking the other, sneak up on any side of the system that you are not accidentally adjusting.
The filters have protruding levers for each function which makes them very easy to use, but in my experiment, each has some flow. While this may make the system a bit larger or more expensive, it would be nice to have a locking mechanism for each component in this particular filter combo to avoid it. Using both hands on the filter completely avoids the problem, but let’s get real, focusing on making it faster and easier, using two hands to keep things in place miss the mark here.
Outside of this small frustration point, the specific filter was smooth and easy to use or switched between cameras and the polarization aspect of things actually worked quite well. The quality of the image was sharp and very little (if any) color cast application was applied, but like all polarizers and NDs, there is a magenta shift if you start applying heavy hand effects.
A few problems have popped up on the VND side of things, but nothing new in the world of variable neutral density. Basically, on a wide lens, if you ramp up the NDK to the upper end, you’ll start to see some “cross-polarization” or “X-pattern” in the images. Sadly this is inevitable in a relatively large lens, but to achieve a “darker” image, the joy of this system is that you can stack more ND filters to get the look you are looking for. H&Y actually solved this problem directly in one of the videos below:
At long focal lengths, this is not a problem as applied to the maximum CPL level as shown in the GIF below and then increasing the ND level to 70mm.
This system is designed to make it quicker and easier for you to replace filters or filters within the camera system, reducing the amount of downtime between shots.
The system really does just that.
That is, once you cross the primary education curve. It took just a few seconds to get past the CPL and VND combo and adapt to other creative filters like drop-in kits, square filters or even rubber lens hoods. In a well-designed shoot, it would be very easy to keep the adapters already in place for each lens and system used, and then the filters could be quickly and easily moved into the system without much thought.
The only downside to using this system is that if you decide to remove the reverting adapters there is no way to use both hands to do this. With a “simple” adapter, it’s easy to hold the camera / lens in one hand and then open the filter with the other. This is not possible with revoring systems.
One hand is needed to hold the “base” in place and the other to open and screw the mounting mechanism. For this reason, the camera needs to be protected by a tripod or something like that. To put it bluntly, the idea is that users will have these adapters already mounted with a cover on each of their possible lenses to avoid the problem of protecting each of their lenses. But if you’re obsessed with properly cleaning and storing things like me, you’ll never want to give up on using these things.
Fast, safe, and effective
The Rivering Swift The system is modular, easy to use, and easily impressive compared to other filter systems I have used over the years. The Swift system is completely modular and allows you to create the necessary combination of filters, hoods and matte boxes to achieve the desired look for both video and still photography.
The switching between the filters is very fast and the optical quality is really impressive. It’s hard not to be impressed with what H&Y has done here.
The H&Y Revoring Swift system is currently available through Kickstarter Where the company has assembled several pre-made bundles for easy purchase as well as discounts on individual item orders. Once the campaign is over, the Swift system will be available directly Company website.
Have options?
Like most professional filter systems, the H&Y reverberation kit isn’t cheap: the kits cost between $ 220 and $ 479 for those who need a complete bundle, and the price range is minimal for those looking for individual items. $ 21 for adapter, $ 199 per filter.
The good news is that there are options, but the prices are the same along the professional side of things. Some options included Lee Filter, Nisi, Format, PolarproAnd for a little more affordable front, you can choose from a wide selection of options Cocaine.
Will you buy it?
Yes. If you are looking for a new filter system, Revoring Swift is a solid option. It’s easy to use and has a ton of flexibility.
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