More on the M finder

<p>An often serious problem I had with my 0.72 M6 was that the 50mm frame was too small, so that I got much more on the negative than I saw in the finder. (I didn't use 35mm enough to comment on it.) I suppose the designers had no option but to squash the 35mm and 50mm frames to make room for the 28mm frame -- in a finder originally designed for 35mm widest.<br>

I wonder if the 35mm frame in the 0.85 finder is too small. That finder magnification is less than that of the M3's finder, in which there was a little space around the 50mm frame, but I have no idea if that makes enough room for an accurate 35mm frame.</p>

<p>Magnification of the finder is only peripherally related to the situation you describe.</p>

<p>The M3 frame is roughly sized for a focus distance of 2 m. The M6, on the other hand, is sized for a focus distance of 1 m. Since the lens is extended further the closer the focus, the field of view is smaller than when focused further away. Consequently the frame is smaller than necessary for normal shooting distances (> 1 m).</p>

<p>The Leica viewfinder is about as good as it gets for a rangefinder camera. Better too much than too little. You can always crop later, but you can't add things cropped in the camera.</p>

<p>The greater the magnification, the more accurate the rangefinder, because the longer its effective base line.</p>

<p>Now that is interesting and makes sense, Edward, since all the early 50's were 1m closest focus and later, .7m, so they would have had more issues with the frame cutting out; I don't know; ears? at .7m, if they had retained 2m as the frame decider.<br>

Where did you get this info? and is 1m still the frame distance for digital M's?<br>

I can see how this might affect landscape for serious enlargement when one is hunting for pixels.</p>

 

<p>It's still a poky finder compared to an external finder.<br>

Good information - thanks for sharing.</p>

<p>You will find the M finders up to the M4-2 more accurate. M4-P onward they shank them. In the digital world, Leica went back to 2M optimized frame lines in the M240 series. Shooting a 50 again on those bodies is nice. I could never wrap my head around the 50 frame lines on my M6.</p>

<p>That is what I meant, Jim. The 0.72 finder came in with the M2 and was meant for 35mm widest. Adding a 28mm frame in the M4-P, while keeping the same finder magnification, required the 35mm and 50mm frames to be made smaller. I did not know about the sensible change brought in with the M240.</p>

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<p>duplicate post</p>

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<p>Where did you get this info? and is 1m still the frame distance for digital M's?</p>

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<p>I'm sure I picked it up in this forum. I have an M9P, and the image contains a much larger area than indicated in the finder. At least it isn't the other way around.<br /> <br /> My first "professional" camera, which I used shooting for a newspaper, was a Leica M2. I still think it was the perfect camera for the job. Yet I remember coveting the accuracy of the newly minted Nikon F. Up to that time, the most advertised SLR was the Exakta. Both the Leica and Nikon were manual focus, and there weren't very many lenses available for either.</p>

<p>The M9P has a 0.68X finder, compared to 0.91x on the M3 and 0.72x on the M2 (and M4). The 28 mm frame lines are well inside the boundaries of the finder, but still hard to see if you're wearing glasses. We are totally spoiled by the 12 mm eye relief on Nikon cameras, from the F3 onward.</p>

<p>The M6 TTL 50mm frame is simply lousy.<br>

It is a wild guess., making skew pix too boot.<br>

My M3 is accurate, as many good SLR finders.<br>

I bought the M6 as my M3 was getting really worn..<br>

I still use M3 in preference.</p>

 

<p>The view-finders of range-finder cameras cannot be particularly accurate because the optical axes of finder and taking lens are not the same. Leitz showed considerable ingenuity in designing the M3's finder, complete with an arrangement to compensate for parallax, and then manufactured it with precision. Even among SLR cameras, there are few with 100 per cent finders. It makes sense to leave a "safety margin". In certain applications, however -- photography on slide film, for example, and more so in slide copying work -- this inaccuracy is a handicap.</p>

<p>That's why Leica developed the copying devices for these cameras, like the BOOWU-M.</p>

<p>There are some things for which the M camera was not designed and shouldn't be used unless you get the needed accessories. Or, just use a film scanner or DSLR and copy stand.</p>

 

<p>The M5 should also be mentioned as having accurate framelines (35/50/90/135mm), for normal, non-closeup shots. The 50mm frameline on my M6, M7, MP, and M9 is much too small. I get so much more in the picture than in the finder, that extraneous details I meant to crop out with the finder, still wind up in the picture. Especially true for the 50 and 90mm frames. Of course, with the M9, I can re-frame and re-shoot once I see my error on the LCD.</p>

<p>Rob, the trouble began when a frame for 28mm was stuffed into a 0.72 magnification finder, which has space only for 35mm (as in the M4 and the M5).</p>