Why does my circular polarizer only seem to work when I rotate the camera, not the filter ring?

Question

I’m using an Olympus E-PL1 with a Hoya HD circular polarizer on a wide-angle lens. When I rotate the filter ring, I don’t see the polarization effect change. But if I rotate the camera from landscape to portrait, the effect becomes visible.

Is this normal for a circular polarizer, or could the filter be faulty? Could it also be caused by a camera display/live-view setting? Is there a simple way to test whether the filter is working correctly?

user4262 · Accepted Answer

Usually, turning the ring changes the orientation of the polarizer just as you'd expect. Since that doesn't happen but rotating the camera does seem to rotate the polarizer, it sounds like one of two possibilities:

You've somehow managed to install the filter backwards.
The filter was assembled with the two plates reversed.

I'm not sure how you could accomplish #1, so I have to guess that #2 is the most likely answer.

If you want to test that the filter is assembled the right way, get another piece of polarized material. You could use a pair of polarized sunglasses, for example, or a pair of polarized 3D glasses. With filter attached to the camera, hold the material, whatever it is, in front of the filter and rotate the ring. The image should get darker or lighter. If you continue in the same direction eventually the filter and (say) glasses will be polarized in at right angles to each other and the image will be completely black. If you see all this, then you're rotating the polarized surface after all, and the filter is fine.

Why does my circular polarizer only seem to work when I rotate the camera, not the filter ring?

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