Sony Found out something interesting about the EVF....both eyes open works great!

rpavich

Veteran
I accidentally stumbled on something what works great when using the EVF; keeping both eyes open, not using an eye cup, and not pressing eye close to the EVF.

It results in much less "tunnel vision" feeling and it's amazingly effective...the EVF stays clear and you can see what's going on around you outside the EVF.

Give it a try!
 
I take it that the magnification of the EVF has to be around 1X or 100% so that the image doesn't get way out of wack?

True, and I don't think that it is...it's not a "binocular" sort of view like a 1:1 rangefinder would be...but it's much better than closing one eye.
 
Kind of depends on the focal length of the lens too, and how close it comes to corresponding to what the bare eye is seeing. Using this approach with a 300mm telephoto wouldn't work, nor with an ultra-wide. What DOES work probably varies by user. I find the 35mm on the RX1 a bit too wide and since I generally shoot at 35mm or wider, its not particularly workable for me. Just playing around with my OMD and LX7 (where I can use zooms), it works best for me at about 50-70mm equivalent fields of view. I never shoot in this range, EVER. So, for me, not so much. But its a pretty classic technique for old rangefinder users and I know some people swear by it. I mostly just swear AT it...

-Ray
 
Kind of depends on the focal length of the lens too, and how close it comes to corresponding to what the bare eye is seeing. Using this approach with a 300mm telephoto wouldn't work, nor with an ultra-wide. What DOES work probably varies by user. I find the 35mm on the RX1 a bit too wide and since I generally shoot at 35mm or wider, its not particularly workable for me. Just playing around with my OMD and LX7 (where I can use zooms), it works best for me at about 50-70mm equivalent fields of view. I never shoot in this range, EVER. So, for me, not so much. But its a pretty classic technique for old rangefinder users and I know some people swear by it. I mostly just swear AT it...

-Ray
Well. that's an aspect that I never thought of...hmm...

I'm taking delivery of my "2nd" X100S this week and I'm going to try it with that camera also.
 
[PET PIEVE RANT ALERT]
The only way to have a fully natural, binocular vision using a viewfinder is to have a <18mm lens with a >2.77x magnification viewfinder.

A single human eye has a horizontal FOV of more than 90 degrees, so <18mm equivalent (the whole thing about normal lenses is a bunch of nonsense).

A 1x viewfinder only looks natural with a 50mm lens (not because 50mm lenses are "natural" or "normal", but simply because 50mm lenses are used to measure magnification); for an 18mm lens to look natural, you'd need a magnification of 2.77, which is more than any camera I know of. Conversely, with magnifications smaller than 1x, you'd need a longer equivalent focal length than 50mm to make the image size appear natural - but note that this only makes the image size appear natural; you're still missing a big chunk of field of view, so your vision is only partially binocular.
[/PET PIEVE RANT ALERT]

[edit] oh, and armanius: from the above follows that, to have a natural size (but not FOV) of the viewfinder image if you're using a 35mm equivalent lens, you'd need a viewfinder with a magnification of 1 / (35/50) = 1.43x.

[edit 2] all the technical mumbojumbo above hasn't stopped me from happily using the X100's OVF or EVF with my left eye open - sure the image in the viewfinder is smaller than the one in the naked eye, but you do get a better sense of your surroundings while still knowing what's going on in the viewfinder. But mostly I just use the rear LCD.
 
Back
Top