Ray Amos WROTE:
A Pentax marketing rep. (a close personal friend) told me that a Pentax
engineer told him a few years ago that they could make the focusing
screen much brighter but as you increase brightness you decrease
contrast. It's all a compromise. Brighter Screen/Lower Contrast or
Dimmer Screen/Higher Contrast. He said that most people associate
higher brightness as being better but the camera prefers higher contrast
(especially for focusing). Maybe some day there will be new technology
that will enable the best of both worlds.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Ray,
You are 100% correct, or should I say your friend is. Same for
sharpness in photos. I have some Zeiss literature explaining
why perceived sharpness is really higher contrast. Same for film,
after all Velvia is not the sharpest slide film but surely the
most contrasty.
Going back to screens for a moment, Minolta makes the Acute Matte
screens for the Hassy, and also have a wonderfully bright screen
in their new Maxxum 7 which I had opportunity to use for a few
weeks. In my Medium format cameras, I use the Maxwell Hi-Lux
screens. These were rated in Pop Photo to be as good as the
more expensive Hassy screens and Maxwell has them to fit
numerous cameras. Bill Maxwell made some for 35mm SLRs
I once owned and they were absolutely amazing. He is a one
mad operation though and makes optics primarily for US government
agencies (loupes, etc.) such as the CIA, FBI, etc.
They are the absolute best loupes and not cheap! I own 2, a 4x and
a 6x which I use for 35mm slides and the 4x for 6x7cm negs.
Bill unfortunately is low-tech when it comes to the Internet so you can
only reach him via telephone or snail mail. If interested, call him
at 1-404-244-0095.
Peter K
*
****
*******
***********************************************************
* For list instructions, including unsubscribe, see:
* http://www.a1.nl/phomepag/markerink/eos_list.htm
***********************************************************
