Focus question - Olympus 35rc & Trip

[abudhabiandy]

Hi from Abu Dhabi,
I've just treated myself to an Olympus 35rc & also a bettered trip. Impulse buys but I've always liked Olympus's.
But now I'm having second thoughts as a few internet forums have mentioned the rangefinder focus - what the heck is this? does this mean some of my shots will be out of focus?
Also, I've also read that the Zuiko lenses are contrasty - will I have to make allowances for this when shooting Tri X?
Any pointers greatefully recieved

 

[nickandre]

No. Most of the time the depth of field covers any focusing errors. With the trip 35 you set it by guestimation. There's also a feet scale on the bottom to assist you if the picture of a head isn't descriptive enough. You set the film speed using the outermost filter ring and most of the time you leave the aperture dial set to A for auto mode. It exposes automatically and very accurately. The aperture numbers are for guide number style flash exposure.

With a true rangefinder there will be a window which allows you to line up the images from two stereo finders. When they line up, you're in focus. That will either be directly inside the viewfinder or in a separate smaller finder.

 

[Monophoto]

The 35RC has a split-image rangefinder - as you look through the viewfinder, there is a rectangular field in the middle of the frame that is slightly yellow. As you focus the camera, you will see that there are actually two versions of the image within that yellow field, and focusing the camera makes one image move with respect to the other. When the two images are lined up exactly, the camera is focused.

Rangefinder focusing works best when there are lines in the image that can be used to focus - it's much easier to align two images of an edge than it is to align two images of a textureless field.

There are two problems that you may encounter with the 35RC. Either my eyes are starting to fail (well, I have had cataract surgery on one eye - getting old is hell) or else one of the images is starting to fade, but it seems to me that its harder to see those two images than it used to be. Of course, I've had my 35RC for 31 years at this point, which is more than half of my life, so either explanation may be correct.

The other problem is that the 35RC used a mercury battery that is nearly impossible to replace. When mercury batteries were being phased out, there was an article in Pop Photo talking about the options that made a specific point of mentioning that some of the available options wouldn't work for the 35RC. Don't recall all the details, but the article specifically cautioned that using a battery with a slightly higher voltage was potentially dangerous in the 35RC because the wiring in the meter circuit couldn't handle larger currents that would flow with a higher battery voltage.

I've thoroughly enjoyed my 35RC - my job involved a lot of travel, and I bought the 35RC specifically to live in my briefcase so that I would always have a camera. It probably has over a million air miles at this point!

 

[abudhabiandy]

Thank you

 

[Russ - SVP]

The Oly RC is a classic. One of the best rangefinders ever made. I had mine calibrated to use the common and much better 1.5v Silver Oxide batteries. The lens is very good too.

Kiron Kid

 

[perkeleellinen]

I found a picture showing the 35RC's viewfinder, the range finder patch is the yellow square in the centre. When you focus, you line up the image in the square with the image in the viewfinder:

http://www.ph.utexas.edu/~yue/misc/35RCvfndr2.jpg

 

[mablo]

The Oly RC is a classic. One of the best rangefinders ever made. I had mine calibrated to use the common and much better 1.5v Silver Oxide batteries. The lens is very good too.

Kiron Kid

I'm using 1,35V hearing aid device cells with my RC. Just add some padding and it is OK. They don't last as well as silver oxide cells but are relatively cheap so I don't mind.

Btw. I happened to read Ken Rockwell praising Oly RC in one of his columns lately. He has some followers and I wouldn't be suprised to see increased demand for this little beauty.

--# mablo

 

[John Hermanson]

You use an MR9 adapter with 1.55 silver oxide battery as the substitute, or have a competent repair person wire in a 1N-6263 schotkey diode. That will adapt camera for the silver oxide 1.55v battery (357, Sr44-W, MS76, KS76, G-13). John, www.zuiko.com

 

[Russ - SVP]