Workaround

[Pfreddee]

As some of you know, I bought a Contax IIA about 2-3 months ago.
It is a wonderful camera, small, uncomplicated, and is a lot of fun to use. I'm using it as my go-to camera for B/W, mostly, with an occasional roll of Ektar 100. There is one gotcha that almost made me sell it: the viewfinder.

It is undeniably squinty. It has no dioptre adjustment lever. I wear glasses, and I flirt with scratching them every time I look through the viewfinder. I can't use the trick of using the dioptre lever to set it so I can look without glasses. On top of that, I'm not really crazy about rangefinder cameras.

BUT, I decided to learn how to work around this because the camera is so much fun, and it has led me to a more contemplative ( slower) approach to my photography. Focus is on target, in spite of the squint. It didn't take long to learn its quirks, and these have endeared it to me. Plus, it didn't cost an arm and a leg for the kit, which I think is in mint condition.

So, how many of you out there have learned to do a work-around with your favourite kit, in spite of its quirks?

Thank you to all who reply.

With best regards, Pfreddee(Stephen)

 

[Rob-F]

The Leica M2 and M3 have no protection against scratching eyeglass lenses. I put a thin coat of Liquid Electrical Tape (the brand name), purchased in Home Depot, over the finder eyepiece. It has helped a lot!

 

[Pioneer]

Squinty? Obviously you have never used a Leica Barnack. 🙂

In addition to using Liquid Tape, you can also cement a rubber o-ring in place with a dab of rubber cement.

Actually, Zeiss did make a threaded plastic/hard rubber collar that screwed into the eyepiece. It helped protect eyeglasses. They are a bit tough to find now days, but if you keep your eyes open they do show up from time to time. I have one that I move between my two Contax IIs.

One work around I have become relatively proficient at is the art of holding a camera over my head to get a photograph of something on the other side of the crowd. Over the years I have actually become pretty good at this. Of course now, with tilting digital display screens, this has become pretty passe. But I was doing this WAYY before digital was even an option.

 

[Elmar Lang]

That ring, that seems so rare, is the same usually mounted on Zeiss Contina cameras: I've bought two of them, one broken and unusable, for less than 5 Euro and now my Contax-IIa and IIIa proudly wear the glass-protection ring.

E.L.

 

[Gareth Rees]

I love my 111a camera...ok it's a bit bigger with the light meter but it's fundamentally the same camera.
Yes the viewfinder is squinty, but if you can find a good auxiliary finder, like say a Tewe, as advocated by Roger Hicks in his Rangefinder Book, well it is so much easier than pearing through the small Contax viewfinder...I focus with that then sight with the Tewe, and so far my pictures have turned out very well, unless I'm getting very close, but even then I find the images are ok.
So, good luck and don't let the viewfinder put you off!

 

[View Range]

You missed two good workarounds - lasik and refractive lens exchange (essentially cataract surgery). As the Germans would say "there is no problem with the camera; the problem is with the user".

 

[Cascadilla]

I feel your pain... with my Contax IIIA I use my reading glasses to use the rangefinder and then shift to a Zeiss 440 turret finder with diopter correction (built in) for viewing. In addition to being a lot easier to see the full frame, you can also correct for parallax which the built in finder can't. The nice part about the 440 is that it will also work for most other Zeiss lens available for the Contax, so you only need the one finder that can then stay on the camera all of the time.