Custom Albada viewfinder?

[shadowleaves]

Are there any manufacturers making custom albada bright-line viewfinders? These will be great add-ons for low-cost 6x12/6x17 cameras, being much more accurate than their primitive viewfinder with masks (e.g., Dayi, Gaoersi, Fotoman, etc).

[Ash]

If there are, and at an affordable price, I'd be interested

[shadowleaves]

I contacted some Chinese factories who could do this. They will need an order of at least 200 viewfinders to start a batch production....alas...

[Ash]

That's a shame. I dont think there are 200 people left who know what 'Albada' is!

[shadowleaves]

aha, nice, a great idea....never thought about it...

thanks for sharing it :)

not quite as elegant as the Albada viewfinder though...



Here is another idea for a finder. I am setting up a "digital finder" for my Fotoman cameras. I got myself a Sony DSC-TX7 camera to replace the Fotoman finder. It is very thin (about 5/8 inch), the rear is all LCD screen with no buttons(3.5 inches), and the front has a tiny lens (zooming is internal rather then external which would look more like a camera on top of a camera). Once the advertising tape is removed from the front of the camera it looks like it was made for the camera. The lens is slightly off center, but the shoe mount is slightly off center and compensates in the other direction so that you're almost dead on (this issue is insignificant). All that remains is to draw my crop lines on the rear protective screen resting over the LCD. So I have yet to use it in the field, but see no problems otherwise.

To attach to the camera I originally got a Manfrotto tilting bracket and realized later I did not need it (it added unnecessary height). Instead I only needed a small male "flash shoe mount" on the bottom of the Sony camera, and then the camera slides directly into the female shoe mount of the Fotoman. The rear LCD has a clear protection cover, and a Sharpie CD/DVD marker (has fine and regular tip) works great to draw your crop lines to match the Fotoman lens viewing angle exactly. The Sony has the pano mode (16:9), so you get a wide view, and the image is well centered on the LCD screen.

DETAILS OF CAMERA
http://www.sonystyle.ca/commerce/servlet/ProductDetailDisplay?storeId=10001&langId=-1&catalogId=10001&productId=1007242&navigationPath=n32090n100454n100451

DETAILS OF SHOE MOUNT- http://www.vistek.ca/store/ProPhotoLightingComponents/129870/manfrotto-262-nikon-flash-adapter.aspx


The LCD has 100% accuracy vertically which is most important to me because I
don't want to clip a tree top or house. On the other hand this Sony only sees
25mm, while the 90mm Nikor f/8 lens for the Fotoman sees 18 degrees, so I get a bit on
the ends cut off. Since I rarely shoot beyond 615, this is not a problem,
but if I want to see out to near 617 I can still use the Fotoman finder as a
guide. For other lenses above 90mm you won't have problems and will get 100%
coverage horizontally and vertically. I still plan on using the Fotoman finder (I'm quite accurate with it, you learn how to use it). So when you have grey clouds or blue sky, you have room to spare for any errors made. But when I need 100% accuracy, my Sony digital viewfinder will come out. The advantages....



1. Digital polaroid- adjust composition, instant view of scene to catch problem areas like dark shadow areas, etc.
2. Exposure compensation slider- allows playing with exposure for different mood. Sometimes the best exposure is boring.
3.. Hi- Def Video- does AVCHD/Mpeg at 1920x1080 (quality really impressed me). Nice having a record of the original scene from camera position.
4. 10mp still photos from Sony TX7- until film gets back from processing, I get an instant check at night on the computer regarding how things turned out.
5. Very bright image- compared to looking on the grounglass using Nikor 90 f/8 with center filter attached. Groundglass viewing not necessary.
6. Only $450

I still need to make a small 90 deg angled piece of metal to slide into the shoe under the right side of the Sony (viewed from LCD side of camera). This would act as a stop for precise alignment of left to right rotation. The camera does not need to be adjusted down or upward....it is centered. I still have not done any field work with it, but I already know it is far more accurate then even a linhof that sees only 90%.

My CS3 is down, so I can't resize the photo for here at the moment. If anyone wants an image, I can email it. Soon as I get around to it I will get my CS3 up and running and download an image here.