300D Viewfinder

[Osman Olgen]

Hi,

This may be asked before, if yes, sorry for that.

I was planning to buy an SLR camera and tried one of my friend's 300D. Problem is the photo I get is larger than what I see. Very little but that's important in my opinion. You may have unwanted objects or you may just want to put an object in the corner for example, you can't do that.

Is there a way to overcome this problem? Are all SLR's like that? I'm currently using Canon A70 and what I see in the LCD is what I get after I download it to PC.
Regads
Osman

[lomond]

I know on the 10D the viewfinder doesn't show the full frame.
Around 90% I think.


The 300D is the same.
The 1D series shows 100% of the frame.

[Osman Olgen]

Lomond,

Do you know why is that? Some people relate it to the sensor's size. They say, it should be 35 mm equivalent. But how can compact cameras do it then? I could not find a logical explanation somewhere.
Osman

[David1943]

I wholeheartedly agree with you but, as far as I'm aware, there's no way of altering the situation.

I believe the viewfinder shows about 92 percent of the actual picture which, at least to you and me, is annoying when we wish to carefully compose a picture using the whole of the frame.

Regards, David :)

[lomond]

Don't really know why. :?
Just checked.
All the prosummer models 10D 20D 350D have a viewfinder field of view of 95%.
The 1D series is 100%.

[willg]

just crop it after you get it on the computer..shouldn't be that big of a deal

[Tixeon]

This is intentional by the camera maker. As far as I know it is intended to give a little extra margin for composition that started way back when 35mm color slides were popular & the slide mount would always mask off a small amount of the image all around the edges.

Tim

[David1943]

just crop it after you get it on the computer..shouldn't be that big of a deal
Agreed, but I was always taught to, whenever possible, utilise the whole of the frame to obtain maximum definition. Also, there are very many people who have prints commercially processed without ever loading their images on to a computer.

Regards, David :)

[Alexandre Gabriel]

This is not related to the sensor.
The Elan 7 / EOS 30 film SLR has 92% viewfinder field.
Why? I don't know :confused:

[Osman Olgen]

I especially wonder why only expensive cameras have 100% viewfinder coverage. Can you give me an example of a Digitl SLR camera with 100% viewfinder and below 5000$? I could not find any.

[lomond]

I especially wonder why only expensive cameras have 100% viewfinder coverage. Can you give me an example of a Digitl SLR camera with 100% viewfinder and below 5000$? I could not find any.


I wondered that too.
Can't think why it's deemed necessary on the 1 series but not on the 10. :?

[Curtis N]

there are very many people who have prints commercially processed without ever loading them on to a computer.Since commercially processed edge-to-edge prints crop the edges off the images, it's probably good that the viewfinder shows a slightly cropped view. One compensates for the other.

Those people would probably be better off with a little P&S digicam. Their investment in a DSLR is being wasted if they aren't utilizing its capabilities.

[ed2day]

Have you ever seen pictures that show the viewfinder frame overlayed on the sensor frame? At 95% it amounts to a thin line surrounding the picture. You'd have to have really small objects to hide behind that line. Look at the lines surrounding the boxes in this thread. It's a little thicker than that, but not a whole heck of a lot. Each line surrounding the viewfinder frame would be about 1% of the width of the picture.

[Curtis N]

At 95% it amounts to a thin line surrounding the picture.For perspective, 95% of a 4x6 print would be 3.90 x 5.85 inches.

So for that print size, the image is giving you an extra 0.05 inches (1.27mm) on the top and bottom and 0.075 inches (1.91mm) on each end, compared to what you see in the viewfinder.

[MTalley]

I was always taught to be optimistic. Therefore, I will unequivocally state that the sensor captures a bonus 5-6% of image area than what you paid for. :D

[Osman Olgen]

I checked all SLR models from dpreivew one by one. Here's a list of SLR's with 100% coverage:

Canon EOS-1Ds Mark II $7999
Canon EOS-1D Mark II $3329
Canon EOS-1Ds $7999
Nikon D2Hs - $3499
Nikon D2X - $5000
Nikon D2H - $3500
Olympus E-1 $1699

Is it a conicidence only most expensive models are like that?
Osman

[muscleflex]

i was surprised also when i first got my 20d! i even posted something on here to ask and make sure my camera wasn't defective!but over time (a couple of days for me) you will learn to get used to it and it won't matter anymore...coz you'll be too busy taking beautiful photographs! :-P at least that's what i tell myself!

[Rokkorfan]

In order to show 100% in the viewfinder SLRs require larger (and hence more expensive) pentaprisms. Additionally, this can mean that the perceived image size in the viewfinder is smaller (viewfinder magnification).

Here's a quote from an article by Mike Johnston on Luminous Landscape:

"Now, if you are a Good Amurricun, you are saying: give me everything. I want it all. I want an optical glass viewfinder with 1X magnification and 100% coverage that is as bright as life and easy to focus manually, that I can see with my eye an inch away from the eyepiece.

Oh, but you cannot have it all, friend. For two reasons. First of all, it turns out that some of these design parameters fight each other from an engineering standpoint [image coverage and magnification]. Secondly, if you are an average Amurricun, you want it all without having to pay for it. No such luck. Good viewfinders are e-x-p-e-n-s-i-v-e.

Roughly speaking, there is a trade-off between magnification and coverage. The higher the coverage, the lower the magnification. Ironically, magnification for 100% finders has to be made lower so that viewfinder information displays can fit in the finder and be within the user's field of view. That's why all the top pro SLRs have 100% coverage but only so-so magnification.

Viewfinder coverage (see definition above) is perhaps the dirty little secret of today's SLRs. The Nikon N55 is typical — it shows you, in the viewfinder, less than 90% of what you're going to get on your film. Of course, this generally works out fine, because most people who use entry-level SLRs also use drugstore and supermarket film processing — which actually use less than 90% of the negative to make enlargements with!

This highly approximate system is self-correcting. It hides slop in many different places. First of all, since consumers never see the edges of the pictures recorded on the negative, they'll never know that their consumer-grade lenses aren't very good at the edges and corners. Since the camera's viewfinder doesn't begin to cover the whole area seen by the negative, it doesn't matter if maybe the viewfinder image isn't centered properly. Since the photofinisher is cutting off the edges of the pictures in enlarging, it doesn't matter if his equipment is registered well, either. Finally, it covers slop in the actual picture-taking — because perhaps the most common failure of tyro shooters is that they don't get close enough or frame tight enough. So, your camera and your processor "zoom in" a bit on your behalf. Everybody goes away happy.

Of course, all this has some disadvantages, too. It makes your lenses longer than they really are. Paid extra for a zoom that goes to 28mm on the wide end, did you? Thought you were shooting at 28mm? Not really — your photofinisher, like your viewfinder, has cropped it down to the angle of view of a 35mm lens. Thought you were using all the negative area available to you for the best quality enlargements? Think again — you're using a patch out of the middle of your 35mm neg that's barely bigger than APS size. And of course, precise framing is pretty much out of the question. Plunk your subjects in the middle of the frame like most rank snapshooters, and you probably won't mind. Otherwise, you'll mind.

One might reasonably ask, what's the point of using an SLR at all if you still can't see what the lens sees?

The main reason coverage is a dirty secret is that this is one camera specification that ordinary consumers simply aren't aware of. One industry insider let it slip to me that most camera purchasers aren't aware that their cheap SLRs have poor viewfinders simply because most camera purchasers have never seen a good one! Yeow.

One of the delightful little lies the industry just loves to tell is that "amateur cameras have 93% finders to correspond to the image area of a mounted slide." I love this one. It makes perfect sense — until you stop to realize two inconvenient little facts. Fact one, less than 3% of film sold in North America is slide film. Fact two, if this is such an advantage, then why do all the top pro cameras have 100% finders — especially since pros are the ones who shoot the most slide film?

The whole situation, when you think about it, is ironic. As more and more people buy cameras by the spec sheet, features and specifications have become more and more important, and manufacturers have loaded down their cameras with features to try to make them sell. Yet when it comes to the most important interface on the camera, most consumers are still ignorant of what the specifications mean — with the predictable result that most cameras have considerably poorer viewfinders now than average SLRs had twenty-five years ago."

Cheers,

Antony

[Osman Olgen]

Muscle,

I don't want to get used to this. Why should I bother with photoshop crops eveytime?

I'm still wondering what's the utlimate technology behind this? Why is that feature only on most expensive cameras if that's common SLR practice?

Osman

[Osman Olgen]

Antony,

Thanks for explanation.
Osman

[Curtis N]

Thanks, Rokkorfan.
It's been a while since I stuck my eye into a good film SLR. Now I understand why the view in my DRebel seems so crappy in comparison.;)

[Rokkorfan]

When I switched to Canon I got a real shock with my 1D2 - at 0.72x magnification (albeit 100% coverage) the viewfinder was tiny for me. I was used to a Minolta manual focus X-570, with 95% coverage but a massive 0.9x magnification. What a dream to look through. Shame I never use it anymore - I will have to console myself looking through my glorious digital files. :)

[DocFrankenstein]

Rebel's viewfinder sucks, because it's built cheaply.

I have Canon A-1 and Drebel. The parameters are:
Rebel: Approx 95% vertically and horisontally. Magnification - 0.8x with 50m lens
A-1: 0.83 magnification, 93.4% vertical coverage, 95.3% horizontal coverage

Now, the actual stats are very different. Remember the rebel's small sensor. Somehow, the magnification is the same... Which means that if you look into the Drebel's viewfinder, it's gonna be around 1.6 times smaller than on the spec sheet.

Also, remember that the mirror is only semi transparent. You get to see only 60% of the light coming off it. Then the pentamirror, which eats light too...

In the end you end up with a dim small low contrast image.

Notice how the Rebel's specs are 95% vertically and horisontally. This means by area, .95*.95 = 90.2 percent coverage. You don't get to see 10% of your photo.

So, the specs without the marketing tricks are:
A-1: 0.83 magnification, 93.4% coverage
Rebel: 0.5 magnification, 90.2% coverage

Count the loss of light in the semi-transparent mirror and the pentamirror, and the difference is huge. Truly a postage stamp at the end of a tunnel.

[bauerman]

From the reviews I have read - the viewfinder in the 300D is pretty good - specific comments about how it is comparable to the 10D WITH and pentaprism are all over - as far as brightness. I have looked extensively through the 300D, 350D, 10D and 20D and I don't see a world of difference. I think that Canon did a fine job of cutting cost on this feature and still getting good light.........