interchangeable lenses

[Kat]

This is going to be a very stupid question, but how do you guys use interchangeable lenses? I mean, how do you see what the lenses are seeing, like if it's tele or wide, how do you know what is within the frame of the photograph that you're taking, since the viewfinder remains the same, regardless?

 

[ray_g]

There are framelines within the viewfinder. These are either constantly present, as in the canon P, or change with the lens that is mounted, as in the Leica M's.

Other camera without this feature, such as the Barnack-type Leicas and copies such as the FSU's, bottom-loading Canon's, as well as other older designs like the Contax/Kiev and Nikon RF's use external viewfinders for the focal length being used.

 

[Doug]

Yup, and even for camera bodies with multiple built-in framelines, these are limited to the most common focal lengths; the specific selection varies with different cameras. External accessory viewfinders then are used for lenses wider than the widest built-in framelines (28 or 35mm) and longer than 90 or 135mm... but then longer lenses are generally less suitable on RF cams anyway.

A very few RF cameras have multi-focal or zooming viewfinders to accommodate certain additional focal lengths other than the typically standard 50mm.

 

[Kat]

Ahhh. That makes sense. I'm sorry to say this person never personally held an interchangeable lens RF, so please forgive the ignorance. Thanks for the explanations, those zorkis are looking much more appealing now.🙂

 

[RObert Budding]

Kat - We're all here to help - and to get another person addicted!

Robert

 

[JasonC]

Kat,

You could use one of those turret/universal finders to see the coverage of different focal lengths. The finders might have bad parallax correction, but they are handy tool for visualization.

Jason

 

[wyk_penguin]

Sorry to blow the cover, but the zorki hasn't got these nice things called projected framelines. You will need the turnet finder.