Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1997/07/24
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Richard Clompus wrote: <<<<< As an experienced user of M Leicas and admittedly a new user of a Leicaflex SL, I have a problem with the Leicaflex. Everytime I take a picture, the viewfinder goes blank for just a split second then as if by magic the image reappears.>>>>>> g'day Richard, Welcome to the reflex world of taking pictures! :) When you use a reflex camera you never actually see the image recorded on the film due to the mirror being lift at the split second of film exposure. And this occurs with all slr cameras unless they have a special type of mirror which I wont bother going into, as it would make no difference to what you are experiencing as a first time slr user. However if there is a major dark time between tripping the shutter and the image disappearing and then re-appearing and this occurs say at 1/1000 of a second, then maybe you have a mirror return problem. Just try tripping the shutter at the highest shutter speed to see if there is an obvious delay beyond the 1/1000. At that speed the mirror should be up and down at 1/1000 of a second, generally speaking. If you are making exposures at slower speeds, say 1/2 second, then obviously you will loose the viewfinder image for 1/2 second while the film is being exposed for that length of time. But the time of the image loss is or should be in direct relationship to the selected shutter speed. Longer exposures beget longer mirror up and nothing in the view finder! The reverse for the short exposures of 1/1000, 1/500th etc. Even with the R8 there is the same loss of image at exactly the time the shutter release is pushed. Think about making an exposure of 1/8000 of a second! That means the mirror goes up and down in almost the same time frame. To the extent you do not think you have lost the image, when in actual fact you lost it for 1/8000 of a second! :) ted