Keith
The best camera is one that still works!
Select a shutter speed that may normally cause some camera shake and a slight loss of sharpness with most SLRs ... 1/15th sec for instance.
Cock the shutter and while holding the camera fairly loosely, take note of the amount of shock you feel through the camera when you trigger it. With an OM it's quite substantial ... my FM3A had less.
Now ... re-cock the shutter and this time press the depth of field preview button on the lens right in with the tip of your left index finger and hold it there as you release the shutter. There will be a marked difference in the feel you get through the camera ... the previously noted 'kick' is just not there. It's almost as shock free as a Leica M.
Even with the lens set wide open the camera is still moving all the hardware that normally stops the lens down as you fire the shutter at smaller apertures. Pressing the depth of field preview button in obviously disengages this mechanism from the camera.
IMO the mirror creates almost no shock at all on an OM ... in fact if I lock the mirror up on my OM-1 when I do this test it makes no perceivable difference to the feel of the camera at all.
Cock the shutter and while holding the camera fairly loosely, take note of the amount of shock you feel through the camera when you trigger it. With an OM it's quite substantial ... my FM3A had less.
Now ... re-cock the shutter and this time press the depth of field preview button on the lens right in with the tip of your left index finger and hold it there as you release the shutter. There will be a marked difference in the feel you get through the camera ... the previously noted 'kick' is just not there. It's almost as shock free as a Leica M.
Even with the lens set wide open the camera is still moving all the hardware that normally stops the lens down as you fire the shutter at smaller apertures. Pressing the depth of field preview button in obviously disengages this mechanism from the camera.
IMO the mirror creates almost no shock at all on an OM ... in fact if I lock the mirror up on my OM-1 when I do this test it makes no perceivable difference to the feel of the camera at all.
igi
Well-known
I sometimes do this (I remember I read about this before on this forum as well) even for fast shutter speeds because I notice it's much more silent!
Sparrow
Veteran
... and it varies from lens to lens too
The mirror of the OM-1, and following models, use a pneumatic cylinder for mirror damping.
I remembered that from the old Pop Photo review of the camera. Then googled to make sure...
I remembered that from the old Pop Photo review of the camera. Then googled to make sure...
Keith
The best camera is one that still works!
I guess the longer the focal length of the lens the more stuff there is in there thrashing around!
I didn't really get this effect with my FM3A though?
ruby.monkey
Veteran
Probably because the Nikon's shutter release was so rough that you never noticed anything else.