Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2004/11/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Dear Howard: Since my entire reason for buying a Leica mount digital wd be to use my Canon 0.95 I think I'll join you in waiting- vroger P.S. if you speak to Joe Yao- give him my best regards- Howard wrote: On Friday, Nov 26, 2004, at 23:20 Asia/Hong_Kong, lug-request@leica-users.org wrote: > Date: Thu, 25 Nov 2004 19:39:07 +0000 > From: Frank Dernie <Frank.Dernie@btinternet.com> > Subject: Re: [Leica] Dodgy RD-1 focus (was Nikon's profits tripled) > Hii Ian, > I suppose it could well be a duff example. Joseph Yao said there have > been delays in supply and Howard's R-D1 which I saw in Hong Kong had a > rangefinder which was off at infinity, and I believe he had a long wait > for a replacement, but the pictures from it seemed great to me. > Normally manufacturers check that their review items are at the highest > possible standard before submitting them. > The reviewer was really enthusiastic about the camera up to the point > at which he was unable to reliably focus wide open. > Perhaps I should take the plunge but haven't really got the heart for a > return saga if I am unlucky. > Frank Hi Luggers, To follow up on Frank's remarks I have received a replacement RD 1 for my original camera after a wait of 7 weeks. The replacement's rangefinder still had misalignment at infinity. I took it because I didn't want to wait any longer. It works quite well in the close up range with all my lenses especially if set at f2.0 aperture or smaller up to 90mm (except the 90 cron - see below). The new RD1 focuses well wide open with the 35 Luxes - both Asph and non - Asph (although my non - asph 35 summilux is so soft wide open that determining whether an image is accurate at 1 meter is certainly in the eye of the beholder! - but I love that lens for its bokeh! :-)). My 50 Lux has its good focus moments wide open in the close range - and sometimes its bad moments - depending on my operator error. Please remember I am at the tri-focal glasses stage so I do have some trouble determining accurate focusing due to eye sight. In terms of longer lenses my 90 Elmarit works without a problem, but the 90 Summicron is not accurate in the middle ranges at all. It just does not focus well - period. Of course, if raked over to infinity and ignore the rangefinder - it cuts beautifully clear images on the CCD. I think one of the factors that needs to be considered about the RD 1, and we all know about, is that the 1:1 rangefinder has a limited base-line (38mm) and fast longer lenses just do not have sufficient depth of field wide open to cover focusing errors. Certainly I had a 75 summilux that would not focus accurately with my M6HM TTL - in my hands and with my eyes - despite sending the lens to Solms to be checked and finally having the rangefinder replaced in the camera - so I don't think we should expect focusing performance from the RD 1 which defies the laws of optics. The other aspect about checking focusing is that instead of waiting several hours for film to be developed and printed or scanned - the instant feed back of digital makes it so much easier to verify at once whether a lens is in correct focus or not - just shoot the pictures and down load the card to your computer and look at the images full screen size. There is no possibility of being confused about your picture taking notes several hours after the fact! With the help of instructions from Don Goldberg via Ed Schwartzreich ( of LHSA Catalogue editing fame) - thanks Ed - I popped the hot shoe off my new RD 1 (as I have done several times with my Bessa R2 in order to adjust it for perfect focusing - both close up and at infinity) and proceeded to see if I could adjust the rangefinder to produce a coincident image at infinity and maintain accuracy also in close up focusing. In sum, after several hours and a couple of hundred pictures downloaded and examined - for my camera you have a choice: You can have accurate close up focusing without a coincident rangefinder image at infinity and quite accurate close up focusing with lenses of not more than 50mm focal length and apertures down to f1.4. In this adjustment - at infinity the coincident images can be adjusted to align horizontally but vertically the image in the rangefinder patch comes close to but does not quite match the stationary image in the finder. It stops just right of the stationary image. Alternately you can adjust the rangefinder image to be perfectly coincident - vertically and horizontally - at infinity but then ALL my lenses front focus by several millimeters at 1 meter. So you have a choice, especially if you want to shoot wide open most of the time, of either reasonably accurate close up focusing and a less than perfect infinity setting, or a perfect infinity and an inaccurate close up performance. For me, I chose better close up performance, and will just have to live with the lack of a coincident image in the rangefinder at infinity. This pains me because, as you all know, I am picky about perfect focusing. To add insult to injury - I was playing with Singapore Lugger Roland Tan's recently acquired RD 1 - which is just two serial numbers away from my camera - and its rangefinder performs perfectly - both in the CU range and with perfect alignment at infinity - so I know that the adjustment can be done - I just don't know how to do it!! Until I picked up Roland's camera I thought the rangefinder had a design limitation but now I'm not so sure. Another comment: the focusing patch remains stationary in the viewfinder and only the frame lines move to compensate for parallax in the close up range. This means that at one meter you are focusing not in the center of the image but in the upper left where the rangefinder patch has remained stationary while the frame lines have moved down and to the right. When you recompose after focusing this may contribute to focusing error - especially when using longer high speed lenses with little depth of field when wide open. In summary, I still think Epson got much of its first digital rangefinder effort right. The electronics are great, the controls well thought out (for me anyway) the control of ISO speed, white balance and B&W filtering indicates that photographers were consulted in the design of the camera but - the rangefinder (or quality control) is clearly compromised and that is too bad - because with a better performing rangefinder the camera would be near to perfect as a first effort and that would have been wonderful. Now I guess we will have to wait for the RD2 model or see what the competition serves up from Zeiss and Leica. In the meantime I am going to stop testing and adjusting and going to go out and take daytime pictures using my Panasonic LC 1 and reserve the RD 1 for night work with the 35 Lux Aspheric. At ISO 1600 and f1.4 that is a combination! And I can focus it! Finally - I am certain Chaussers D'Image got a bum sample and they should ask for another camera and run the tests again. Bad form for Epson not to have checked the camera before handing it over. Howard ( frustrated in Hong Kong)