Nikon Viewfinder Used on Modern Shoe Mount!

[mike_foster5]

Will using a Nikon viewfinder from the old rangefinder days on a current (D3/D300) shoe cause a 'short'.. Will I hurt my camera by doing this?

Can I get around it by insulating the contact area? Any idea's?

[robert_hooper1]

I would think the possibility of damage to be eminent. You might try two layers of black electrical tape on the bottom of the

viewfinder. Of course your question begs the question, why do you ask?

[john schroeder]

Why do you need a separate viewfinder? Just use the live view feature and hold the camera at arms length in front of you. <snarky comment>

[mike w]

Two layers of electrical tape will probably be too much just use some plastic like from a blister pack of batteries or the like.

 

Mike

[nolan_ross]

Take 2 tylenol and go to bed. Hopefully the idea will go away by morning. Just kidding but the risk would outweigh any possible benefit whatever that might be.

[joseph_wisniewski]

You can't hurt a Nikon camera by shorting hot shoe contacts together, or to ground. All the outputs are what's called "open drain", all they do is switch to ground, something outside the camera has to pull them up. You can't hurt a device that only switches to ground by grounding it.

 

Now, as someone who has been using Voigtlander and other rangefinder aux finders on a hot shoe of a Nikon DSLR for infrared for years, can I ask what evil scheme you're up to?

[john schroeder]

Joseph has a good point. I withdraw my snarky comment if you are thinking about shooting infrared. I don't think the D3 or D300 can shoot infrared due to their strong filters in front of their sensors.

[lex_jenkins]

If in doubt, cut a strip of the desired size from the leader of a roll of film. It will be thin enough to slip between the hot shoe and foot of the accessory viewfinder, but durable enough to last for many reuses.

 

I've used this trick for many years to disable the battery connection in my Minolta Autometer IIIF. Excellent incident/flash meter, but tends to drain the expensive 28L battery. Between uses I slip a strip of film between the battery positive terminal and meter contact. During use I slip the film strip under the battery, where it's handy for the next reuse. A strip usually lasts a year or two before I need to replace it.

[joseph_wisniewski]

"cut a strip of the desired size from the leader of a roll of film"

 

Do you mean like the white film one uses in an inkjet to make backlit images for trade show presentations?

 

You had an "excellent" Minolta Autometer IIIF? I've always considered that little POS to be one of the reasons Minolta is no longer in the camera business. I've fixed a lot of them, problems ranging from the leaky transistor that causes your battery draining problems, to solder splashes, solder hairs, skewed components. I had never saw a piece of commercial electronics built to such poor standards before. This was a common theme across many samples of IIIF. I added "real" on/off switches to a few before I learned that Minolta built 100% of the IIIF meters with the wrong transistor.

 

It reminded me of when I was 13 years old, and used to buy big boxes of returned toys from the local Radio Shack store. Things they didn't send into repair because the repair center charged the store more to fix them than the items cost in the first place. (A 13 year old's time is a little less expensive).

[lex_jenkins]

Yeh, you remember "film", Joseph. Reacted to light. Ancient technology. Now used mainly for patching holes in roofs and performance art pieces in an ironic retro way.

 

I may have one of the few reliable IIIF meters in existence. The thing is beat to pieces, ugly as an old tractor tire, and keeps working. It feels cheap and flimsy, definitely wouldn't have been worth full retail pop, but I bought mine for five bucks in a pawn shop because the battery was dead and the clerk didn't know what it was.

[keith_b1]

OT, back when I first worked on motion picture/TV shows, the IIIF was the 'Children's Light Meter', 'cause it sensed the light level then

figured out the f stop for you. Also, because it measured(or more correctly, displayed) in 10ths of stops, all of a sudden the certain

DP's began to light in 10ths of stops(useless, since the speed of the film stock can routinely be off by 1/3 to 1/2 stop), which of course only

reinforced the 'Chlidren's Meter' thing.

[joseph_wisniewski]

Lex, thanks for the reminder. Yup, I remember that plastic stuff that reacted to light. Pale greenish white, shine light on it, then turn off the room lights, and it glows for a while... I have a couple of Duncan "Imperial" yo-yos made from it, and a Frisbie.

 

Keith, the 'Children's Light Meter'? LOL! I'll have to remember that one, and the rest of your story.