S3 Olympic

Ken Ford

Ken Ford

Refuses to suffer fools
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Feb 18, 2006
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It’s here! I was a little worried about the shutter curtains not being titanium like I wanted, but they are. Condition is great, the shutter sounds good and everything works well. It can use a prism cleaning, but I’m intending on having a CLA done so that can be addressed then. Shown here with my old 35/2.5:

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I have to tell you - I was holding my breath as I unwrapped it, and then it took my breath away.

I’ve been trying to pin down the year I first fell in love with a S3 Olympic. It was at a camera show, a local gentleman had a table of Nikon RF on display only. (It may have been Mr. Rotoloni himself, I think he lived in the Chicago area.) It was either 1977 or 1978. That’s how long I waited for this…
 
Pretty. How's the contrast of the rangefinder patch? Any flare issues with the viewfinder? Over the years I had two different silver S3's in the house on separate occasions, and the viewfinder on one flared so badly it was useless. The other was decent; wish I kept it. Alas, only two hands.
 
Contrast is pretty weak, but I hope cleaning the prism will help that. Flare is good, I just had it out in midday sun and didn’t notice anything out of hand. In what situations were you getting flare so I can test?
 
Ken Ford said:
Contrast is pretty weak, but I hope cleaning the prism will help that. Flare is good, I just had it out in midday sun and didn’t notice anything out of hand. In what situations were you getting flare so I can test?
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Any type of side lighting. One S3 in my possession was fine, no issue, and the other flared so badly it would white out the viewfinder. This was some years ago, so it's just to the best of my memory. Obviously, I didn't keep it and sent it back to the seller. The black paint S3's look nice.
 
I just did multiple 360° pirouettes in the front yard, no flare noted but the neighbors are worried about me.
 
Ken are you going have Precision service it? Dave did a viewfinder cleaning on an SP for a client of mine recently, very pleased.
 
splitimageview said:
Ken are you going have Precision service it? Dave did a viewfinder cleaning on an SP for a client of mine recently, very pleased.
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That’s my plan! The body and the 35 while it’s there.

The VF is pretty clean, I’m just wondering if a prism cleaning would improve the contrast. I’ll see what they say.
 
Really nice! Jealous a bit - I'm considering seeing if I can sell/trade a few more items to see if I can get one. Service might help the RF situation...
The RF patch is not great on most of these - my two S3 cameras are both GOOD -one was serviced and the other is the Y2K Black - both are better than my S4.

I think I need a brassy S3 Olympic...:)
 
Ken Ford said:
That’s my plan! The body and the 35 while it’s there.

The VF is pretty clean, I’m just wondering if a prism cleaning would improve the contrast. I’ll see what they say.
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S3's are known to have lower contrast rangefinder patches. You probably already know that. I cleaned the prism mirrors of the vintage S3 I had, instructions are here, on this forum, but it really didn't improve anything. No doubt a professional will do a better job. Anyway, people say you get used to the lower contrast and it's generally not an issue. You can always tint the glass to boost the contrast. I no longer have the S3, it's over in Hong Kong now, but it was fun to use. I sometimes think, maybe I need a black one ...
 
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steveyork said:
S3's are known to have lower contrast rangefinder patches. You probably already know that. I cleaned the prism mirrors of the vintage S3 I had, instructions are here, on this forum, but it really didn't improve anything. No doubt a professional will do a better job. Anyway, people say you get used to the lower contrast and it's generally not an issue. You can always tint the glass to boost the contrast. I no longer have the S3, it over in Hong Kong now, but it was fun to use. I sometimes think, maybe I need a black one ...
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You know, once upon a time I thought of that - putting a piece of yellow gel over the window to increase contrast like people used to do with the LTM filters. I’ll wait and see what the tech says.
 
i still had problems with the gel filter in some situations on my LTM Leotax, I tried blue and yellow, some situations it got better, others it seemed worse with the flare. on really bright days

But a piece of developed b&w film that tinted the RF slightly from a Minox that didn't open the shutter, was just enough to make it a better for me.
 
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