speed of focussing?

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tlitody

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Can someone tell me the relative speed of focus between a rangefinder like the zeiss ikon compared to a manual focus slr.
I'm used to just using the ground glass on my slr with fast glass so I can see pretty well. With a rangefinder is it just as quick or do you need to look for edges to focus on? I'm thinking exact focus plane rather than just relying on dof to cover it so where you are shooting wide open (or near to wide open).

Thanks
 
It's going to vary based on your comfort with SLR's and selection of lenses.

I can generally focus an 85/2 more quickly on an RF than I can on an SLR. Same with fast 50's, the RF is quicker for me. For Telephoto's greater than 105mm/135mm, the SLR is faster.
 
I would say it comes down to the confidence of the operator. One isn't faster than the other. But a rangefinder does need a point to focus on and then recompose.
 
I find it faster, in most cases, to focus with a rangefinder — on ground glass, I tend to doubt my eyesight when I think it's well focused, and I take more time to do so. Hence, I'm more careful shooting my SLR wide open.

With a rangefinder, the images snap into place, so for me, there's less doubt about it.
 
It's easy to misfocus slightly with an SLR depending on your eyesight. Focusing a rangefinder's like putting the round peg in the round hole ... it's either in or it's not! I'm not sure that it's faster but it's more definitive in many ways.
 
Like Keith said, RF focusing is more definitive. I personally prefer RF focusing than SLR focusng precisely because it is more definitive. When shooting film, I have a greater confidence level that I got the shot or totally missed focus and thus need to try again. With an SLR, there's always that little nagging feeling that I won't know for sure whether or not each shot is in focus until I get develop the film.

Also, while I've owned some great manual focus Nikon SLR's (FE2, FM2N, F3, FM3A), I've just always felt there was something missing with the manual focus SLR experience. For some reason I cannot explain (and it's probably just me), I don't "connect" with the subject as well with a manual SLR as I do with an RF. An RF just seems more intimate... again don't ask me to explain.
 
A 1967 300/4.5 Nikkor-H on a Nikon D1. The focus confirmation on an SLR does help, even with old lenses.

picture.php
 
It's taking plenty of practice but Im really starting to get fast with the Leica Range Finder Leica M3/M6/M7. For me it's plenty fast using lenses 50mm and shorter. One thing that I really appreciate is the brightness of the viewfinder when using the camera is low light. And I concur about the accuracy as I often shot wide open @ 1.0 and Im amazed at how good the rangefinder works. Im still getting the hang of using the rangefinder for moving subjects but have already achieved some level of success. I still say that the range rangefinder camera works well combined with my Nikon system.




Nikkor 300 2.0 IF ED AIS on D3 hand held.



Leica 50 1.0 Noctilux on Leica M7

Gregory
 
I don't find any of them faster than the other.

After 25 years of focusing SLR's, I started to focus with rangefinders less than a year ago, and I felt it was very slow. Now I find it easy. An advantage of rangefinder focusing is that your vision is not affected by filters... ND ones, for example, are a problem with SLR's unless you're doing tripod work...

Cheers,

Juan
 
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