Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1998/10/26
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Joe Berenbaum wrote: > > I wonder if such a thing exists- I'd like an accessory viewfinder to use on > 35mm bodies that gives the field of view for a 35mm or 50mm lens but with > the ends chopped off so that it shows a square frame, ie it would show what > I would get if I cropped the negative to make a square print. Joe - I've printed most of my photos square for many years, both 35mm and 6x6, so I've wrestled with this question before. If you have an SLR on which you can get to the focusing screen (like old Nikons with removable prisms or newer ones with removable screens) you can do what I do and mark a square format on the screen using very thin tape. I use Chartpak (brand) tape that's about 1.5mm wide. You get it at artist or drafting supply stores in a wide variety of colors - I use translucent blue. It's made for laying out charts and graphs (I think) but it works great on focusing screens, and comes off without leaving nasty residue (as long as you don't burnish it down hard on the screen.) As far as the Leica rangefinders go, I called Leitz service many years ago to see if they would be willing to notch the frameline mask in the viewfinder to indicate corners for a square format, but they declined to even talk about doing it. I also called Marty Forscher (sp?) to see if he could do it, but he also declined. I admit I may not have described what I wanted precisely enough to the people I talked to, or it may just not be technically feasible. But I had seen a diagram of the way the viewfinder framelines were masked and unmasked by a sliding plate, and thought it might be possible to just widen the top and bottom frame line cutouts a bit to indicate where the corners of a square print would be. I admit I don't have enough of the details of the masking system to know if this would really work. Cheers, Kip