Laforet
Nowhere Man
At first I brought a CV 15mm, the finder that came with it was a real treat: Bright, little CA, very clear view and a strong barrel distortion like the Alpa finders. I dropped it once in the first week I had it, it survived with no problem, so they must be tougher than one might have thought for plastic viewfinders. However two month later it handed on solid marble floor and the front element promptly cracked. Realising the price for a replacement finder is almost half the price of a brand new lens WITH the finder, I have decided to buy a CV21/4 lens whose finder nearly resembles the coverage of 15mm outside the frameline. By the way I had to sell my 20mm Nikkor and ended up having more cash in my pocket 😛
After using 21mm as a substitute for a while, I got fed up. The extreme edges of the finder suffer from a lot of CA, and the worst part is that you actually have to move your eye around to see the entire 15mm view. I mailed Steve to see if he was able to order a front element alone for my 15mm finder and he could not help. I was left on myself to improvise.....
So I opened up both finders, and to my surprise the inner layout is almost identical: The big front element is fully interchangeable between the two and I could only deduce that they were the same in both designs. All other elements have exactly the same construction and power(The 21mm eyepiece is a doublet with the framelines glued in between, other dimensions are the same to the 15mm eyepiece). The only exception is with the third element just before the eyepiece: there are two slots built to fit this element, in the 21mm finder the element is placed firmly in the slot closer to the eyepiece and vice versa for the 15mm finder. Conversely, I was able to get the old 15mm view back by moving the third element away from the eyepiece on the 21mm finder, however the framelines will show more coverage than it should have for 21mm.
Conclusions and guesses:
All CV black plastic finders, from 15mm to 28mm (I would like to know if the 40mm finder also falls into this catagory but that might be less realistic), share much of the same components including the casing and the front/rear elements. The inner parts were manipulated to give different magnification and coverage. And most importantly, it is entirely feasible to convert them in case of need, all that takes is a small philips head screwdriver.....😉
After using 21mm as a substitute for a while, I got fed up. The extreme edges of the finder suffer from a lot of CA, and the worst part is that you actually have to move your eye around to see the entire 15mm view. I mailed Steve to see if he was able to order a front element alone for my 15mm finder and he could not help. I was left on myself to improvise.....
So I opened up both finders, and to my surprise the inner layout is almost identical: The big front element is fully interchangeable between the two and I could only deduce that they were the same in both designs. All other elements have exactly the same construction and power(The 21mm eyepiece is a doublet with the framelines glued in between, other dimensions are the same to the 15mm eyepiece). The only exception is with the third element just before the eyepiece: there are two slots built to fit this element, in the 21mm finder the element is placed firmly in the slot closer to the eyepiece and vice versa for the 15mm finder. Conversely, I was able to get the old 15mm view back by moving the third element away from the eyepiece on the 21mm finder, however the framelines will show more coverage than it should have for 21mm.
Conclusions and guesses:
All CV black plastic finders, from 15mm to 28mm (I would like to know if the 40mm finder also falls into this catagory but that might be less realistic), share much of the same components including the casing and the front/rear elements. The inner parts were manipulated to give different magnification and coverage. And most importantly, it is entirely feasible to convert them in case of need, all that takes is a small philips head screwdriver.....😉
