KASE K9 review

Today we bring you the KASE K9, an aluminum filter holder that will delight any photographer.

Well, my name is Héctor and today I am going to introduce you to the KASE K9, a 100mm lightweight aluminum filter holder, now you will see everything that is included in the wonderful little box in which this filter holder comes.

Why 100 millimeters?

It is a quite common question, in this post we are going to see the 100mm equipment, in this case from the KASE brand.

If you want to know what equipment you need for your camera or for your lens (which is almost more important than the camera), I recommend you watch this video first.

What is the KASE K9 filter holder like?

The KASE K9 filter holder is small, light and made of aluminum, it comes pre-assembled with 2 guides to accommodate 2mm filters, this will allow us to work with two filters at the same time plus the polarizer which we will talk about later.

On one side of the K9 we have a red wheel and on the other side of the filter holder we have a red threaded screw, this screw will allow us to fix the filter holder to the adapter ring that is threaded on the lens by means of a tab, another detail of this filter holder is that it has a neoprene gasket housed, normally this gasket is glued on the filters but in this filter holder they are not necessary.

Important: If you are going to mount a filter that is not from KASE in a filter holder of this brand, it is necessary to remove this gasket, it is very simple, it is easily removed with your fingers and does not leave residues on the filter, it is necessary to remove it so that it does not the seal of the filter is crushed with that of the filter holder and ends up leaving the filter stuck in the guides.

KASE filters come prepared without assembled gaskets, yes, in case you need them for another filter holder from another brand, the filter gaskets are included in the box.

What does the KASE K9 filter holder include?

The following is included in the portafilter box:

• 4 adapter rings (67,72,77,82) of these four, two of them are magnetic (77,82), these are the ones we call mother because they are the special ones to house the polarizer.

• 90mm glass magnetic polarizer

• A set of 2mm guides to add to the 2 that are mounted on the filter holder and thus have 3 guides for mounting filters. To add this guide, it is only necessary to remove the four screws, place the guides and screw again with the longer screws included as well.

• 1.1mm guide set to accommodate up to 3 KASE Slim filters.

There are situations in which we will need to work with three filters, let's imagine that we need an ND, we want to set up a soft gradient filter (GND Soft), for example, and then an inverse gradient filter (GND Inverse), this situation where we need three filters, because light demands that amount of filters, it can be solved with the KASE K9 filter holder, even in addition to those 3 filters you can have the magnetic polarizer mounted without problem, also comment that the magnetic polarizer can be replaced by KASE magnetic ND's specific for this filter holder, without a doubt this filter holder offers us a sea of ​​possibilities.

How do you assemble and work with the KASE K9 filter holder?

The filter holder is made up of two parts, the filter holder itself, which is where the guides are mounted, and then the adapter, in this case we have to use the mother adapter (77 or 82).

On the back of the filter holder you can find two engraved marks, these marks indicate the location of the two tabs where the adapter will fit, in these tabs we will insert the ring, as a reference the letters engraved on the ring will go towards the camera, to mount the adapter What we have to do is tilt it and insert it inside those tabs, then we turn the red wheel and we already have it assembled.

The included polarizer is very good (Wolverine series), the best series from KASE, it is an almost unbreakable series, it has a protection layer so that it cannot be broken and cannot be scratched, it is of exceptional quality, it is a polarizer that remembers to the old linear polarizers, but this one is circular for modern cameras although it works very, very well, many customers have told me that they are very happy with this polarizer.

The mounting of the polarizer is magnetic, it is assembled in a simple way, there is no danger of it falling, it is totally reliable and if we want to polarize we turn the red wheel and we can do everything we want, it is fantastic. If we do not want to work with it, it has two slits that allow us to remove the polarizer in a simple and fast way.

If we want to work with our ND filter, which as always is the first to mount, it is not a recommendation, it is mandatory, okay? Always mount the ND first and make sure, above all, that there is no type of opening left above or below that can allow light to filter through, if this happens it will ruin all our photos. The guides are super soft, they take the filter by the sides, they do not clamp the filter, this means that it will not mark the filter and that it will allow extreme smoothness to work with them. I know that there are users who are still working with gradients and who want to be able to move the gradient in the middle of the shot because they still think that the graduation part can come out in the image, well, this filter holder allows you to easily do that, I'm something I don't use it regularly, the thing about moving the filter, I never move it since the gradients of now are much better than the old ones, but if someone wants to move the filter, they know that with this filter holder they will be able to do it easily.

This 100 series filter holder can work from 49 to 82 millimeters, later we will talk about those 49mm and those rings so small that they have peculiarities, but hey, now we have the 72mm mount, in this case we have the 72-82 ring and we mount an 82-mm magnetic adapter, but it turns out that we only want to work with the polarizer, that we are going to take a shot only with paralyzed and we do not want to mount any other filter, because with the magnetic ring we already have the equipment mounted, we can rotate calmly the CPL and work calmly only with this part mounted, it is not necessary to assemble all the equipment.

Recommendation, "do not leave any filter mounted on the lens", it is essential to screw the rings directly to the lens to avoid surprises with vignetting.

As I have mentioned before, what problem can we have with very small rings? When we have very small rings and we are using a 100 unit (a 100 unit is a standard unit) we can have the problem if we work with a gradient already There is no problem with ND's, since the ring is so small it will cover a very small area of ​​the filter, turning it into an ND, for such small equipment the best is the 75mm KASE equipment, the K75.