Brightest / easiest to focus manual SLR?

You probably can't beat a camera with the proper eye piece for your eye and a Maxwell screen installed. If this is a Nikon (F2 or F3 maybe) then you can also obtain a swing-away 2X eyepiece magnifier to attach to the eyepiece for critical focusing.

bblhed said:

I know a lot of people are pushing 35mm, but have you looked at medium format?

Nice big film, nice big lens, nice bright viewfinder, or even hip level viewing. yes, they are big and heavy, and the film is hard to find (in a store on a shelf) and expensive but the results are great. As for focusing, I have a Pentax 6X7 with a metered prism that I shoot handheld and while I can focus it fairly easily, it takes me some dexterity to get the job done.

Just like everything else, as it gets harder to see, get a bigger one.

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I found the Mamiya C330 hard to focus because it was relatively dark with a prism on it even in the day light.

The Hasselblad with the Accumat-D screens is easy to focus on the large viewing area.

Steve

I've cycled through a lot of 35mm SLRs and the Pentax ME super and OM have the biggest, nicest viewfinders I've come across, although I prefer the Olympus because they don't focus backward. I sold my F4 because of the pathetic viewfinder. Half the viewfinder on a camera twice as big as my OM; I'll never understand some forms of technological devolution.

John Hermanson said:

OM-1/1N/2/2N with 2-4, 2-13 screen. John

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I agree with John. I have been using Olympus cameras for 27 years now. I just got to use an OM-3Ti with its standard 2-13 screen and a 55mm f1.2 Zuiko lens. The difference is like the difference of old TV and Hi-Definition TV.

I find most any SLR with a split image focusing aid to be easy to achieve
correct focus.

The best one for me is the Canon T-90. The focus snaps into place, especially with fast lenses, such as the FD 35mm f/2 SSC. Close second is the Leica R7. The Leica finder is as bright and a little contrastier, but the Canon viewfinder/lens combination is very quick and accurate to focus.

Brightest / easiest to focus SLR

It has been noted that the camera with the brightest finder is not always the easiest one to focus. I find the Minolta X-700 with a grid screen to be both bright and easy to focus. It is easier for me to use older M42 lenses with an adapter than to use them on any of my M42 mount cameras. With the grid screen I don't have to worry about getting the subject in focus with a distracting focusing aid and then recomposing. I can focus on any part of the screen. It is not likely that any third party company made focusing screens for the X-700 which were better than the ones Minolta made. For very close macro work or with very slow lenses I prefer a plain matte screen. I find changing screens in the X-700 annoying so I leave a grid screen in one, a plain matte screen in another and the standard screen in the rest. Where Canon manual focus cameras are concerned, if I use an L screen in an F-1 or F-1n it is very close in brightness to using an F-1N with the same type screen. The older Konica Autoreflex cameras did not have the brightest finders but the T3 is not "1960s technology." The T3 came out in 1973. I have a T2 with transplanted Nikon E screen (grid) and also an FT-1 with a transplanted E screen. These are handy for macro work and with slower lenses so I don't have focusing aids in the center blacking out.

Before I had Nikon FE and FE2 cameras I got an N2020 for macro work. At first I had planned to replace the standard screen with a B or E screen but I found that the standard screen was fine. The N2020 has fairly primitive auto focusing but I don't use its AF so that doesn't bother me. The FE and FE2 have viewfinders which are not as bright as those in the Olympus OM-1 to OM-4series but they seem more contrasty. It's funny about the Olympus cameras. All five of my OM bodies have non-interchangeable screens. I have three OM-10s, an OM PC and an OM 2000. The OM-10 has a pretty bright viewfinder. I may have one of them overhauled to get a grid screen put in. The OM 2000 is made by Cosina and has the same fairly good viewfinder as the other Cosina-made SLRs I have.

Other SLRs with nice finders that I have include the Minolta SRT 201, Nikon F2, Canon FT QL, Canon FTb/FTbN, Nikkormat FT3. Which ones have less nice finders? Pentax Spotmatic, Pentax Spotmatic II, Mamiya 500 DTL, Mamiya ZE, Mamiya NC1000/NC1000S, Miranda Autosensorex EE, Vivitar 220SL.

The Olympus OM single-digit cameras are the best I've tried. All have very large and bright viewfinders. The drawback is the view can be almost too large if you wear glasses due to the short viewpoint so I would recommend the OM-3 or OM-4 as they have dioptric adjustment and allow you to use the camera without glasses. The later OM-4 and the titanium versions are the best bet due the reduced battery consumption on these models. I have heard the 2-13 screen is the best though these seem to be as rare as hen's teeth.

The OM's are the Kings of the lot

jp498 said:

I have not used a F3HP, but my F4s has a slightly smaller image due to the extra stuff it displays. It does have adjustable diopter though, which isn't important for me. The pentax 67 SLR is pretty big and bright too, but it's not a 35mm.

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I can't say the same about pentax 67. I sold mine since I found it hard to focus due to dim viewfinder and bought pentax 67II which is way better.

I haven't used enough SLRs to say which is the best, but of the three dozen or so I've used, the one that stands out for me is the Contax RTS. I'd only gone into the shop to have a play, nothing else, but as soon as I put it to my eye, I knew that I was leaving with it. You can almost hear the pop as the image passes in and out of focus. That big and sublime Planar f/1.4 helps a lot, too.

The cameras I've used include all Leicaflex variations, Leica R3, R4, R-E, R6, R8, Nikon F, F2, Nikkormat FTN, Olympus OM-1 & OM-2, Pentax Spotmatic and ME, Minolta SRT-series and Canon FTb. Of these, the ones I like best are the Leicaflex SL if you don't need diopter correction, or Leicaflex SL2 with the Leicaflex SL viewscreen if you do need diopter correction.

Following these in approximate order of preference are Leica R8, R6 and R-E, Nikon F & F2 & Olympus OM, then Leica R4 and R3 and Nikkormat FTN, Pentax ME, Canon FTb, and Minolta SRT-series, and Pentax Spotmatic. For those who are over 40 years old, diopter correction is very important and will make most of these cameras a pleasure to use.

OM-1 and OM-2 have large viewfinders, the OM-3 and OM-4 had to shrink magnification to 0.84x in order to fit all the information in the display. I prefer the OM-1 over the OM-4, and I have both!