Alternative viewfinder options for F3???

Allan Legarth Nielsen · February 11, 2011

As you know the viewfinder on the F3 is not really handy, and the alternatives from Red Rock and Zacuto is not really the deal either.

Does anyonw know if you can use some of Sony's own viewfunders, like the HDVFC35W, which is used on the F23 and F35?

Would be nice, so the camera would get that extra bit of professionalism.

Mitch Gross · February 11, 2011

First off, that viewfinder costs almost as much as the camera. If you still want to go forward it would be a bit of a project. You would need to take the SDI signal coming out of the camera and change it to a component one to see the viewfinder. You would also need to feed 12v power and build a mounting bracket for the viewfinder. All of this could be done but it would be an expensive proposition. If you're really interested please let me know as we could build this for you. But I suspect that by the time you're done the camera & viewfinder combination would be in excess of $30,000.

Brian Drysdale · February 11, 2011

another alternative is the Cineriod.

http://www.octica.tv/pdfs/cineroid_evf_4l.pdf

I expect third party manufacturers will supply V/Fs which are higher quality than the current designs intended for the DSLRs. The F3 isn't the only camera, the AF100 has a similar problem when hand holding.

Mitch Gross · February 13, 2011

Yes, we sell the Cineroid and it works quite well. It actually has a bunch of features such as pixel-to-pixel zoom. It's not the Sony viewfinder, but then again that's about 15x the cost. The Zacuto and the RedRock EVFs are on the way, but the CineRoid is available now.

http://www.abelcine.com/store/Cineroid-Electronic-Viewfinder-EVF/#tabs

Allan Legarth Nielsen · February 14, 2011

First of all I would pay that amount of money if it was for myself :-) But I'm the equipment responsible/camera prep tech at a rental house in Copenhagen, and I as just looking for a way to make it more attractive for our customers.

We kind of have to, we're not happy about as we used to rent out our 35mm Arri cameras out a lot more, but times has changed and Denmark doesn't have a lot of money to make films, so.... :-(

Phil Rhodes · February 14, 2011

What's the spec on the Sony viewfinders? I've seen the ancient black and white thing that used to come with the first F900s, and I've seen the thing Red bought out, and I thought they were both crap (I'm one of those people irked by stroboscopic colour artifacts).

Yet to see anything worthwhile that wasn't 24" across the diagonal, sadly.

P

Mitch Gross · February 15, 2011

Well with that attitude I'm sure you'll love the Sony color viewfinders! :rolleyes:

Vincent Sweeney · February 15, 2011

http://www.zacuto.com/zfinderevf

The features look pretty impressive (for this kind of thing). I wonder how far off it is.

Phil Rhodes · February 15, 2011

Ah yes, once again it's my "attitude" that causes me to get a headache whenever I watch a single-chip DLP. I do apologise. I shall immediately suppress the pain.

For christ's sake.

This is the sort of attitude we get from 3D weenies.

P

Mitch Gross · February 15, 2011

I meant that coming at it from the "everything I've seen is crap -- how's your's" perspective makes it hard for me to expect that you'll find much to like.

I personally agree about most progressive sequential finders. I move my eye across the frame and see tearing.

The Sony uses a nice LCD panel. How good that panel is for your eye is something you'll have to decide for yourself. Certainly it won't be a 24" monitor, but it's pretty sweet and a lot of people like them a lot. Don't know what other terms to put them in.

Phil Rhodes · February 17, 2011

I had a look at an Alexa viewfinder yesterday, and it wasn't crap.

P

Mitch Gross · February 17, 2011

Phil, do you mind if I contact ARRI Marketing to see if they want to publish your quote on that? "The ALEXA viewfinder -- it's not crap!"

:D :D :D

John Holland · February 17, 2011

I was with Phil at the time and can confirm he was impressed , its a great viewfinder . I dont think Arri need any help from him or me !

John Holland · February 17, 2011

Sorry a PS Phil also was very taken with the Phantom Range .

Phil Rhodes · February 17, 2011

Yes, but I was somewhat more taken, in a purely practical sense, with the high speed cameras made by lots of other companies, which are nearly as good and a whole lot cheaper.

P

Dom Jaeger · February 18, 2011

Phil, do you mind if I contact ARRI Marketing to see if they want to publish your quote on that? "The ALEXA viewfinder -- it's not crap!"

:D :D :D

The funny thing is, compared to every other viewfinder Arri has manufactured since probably the 70's, the Alexa viewfinder is crap.

Every time you adjust the eyepiece it moves the diopter, and there's no way of locking the diopter off. Not even relubricating the diopter threads with heavier grease solved it. The best solution I found was using an eyepiece from an Arri cine camera.

That said, it is the best non-optical viewfinder I've seen.

Phil Rhodes · February 18, 2011

I only had a two-minute play with it, so I didn't find out about that - on the day I actually get to shoot with an Alexa, the devil will be riding to work on a snow plough.

Does anyone know what the native resolution is?

P

Mitch Gross · February 20, 2011

ARRI EVF native resolution is 1280x720. Yup, it's pretty gorgeous.

Phil, I'm not sure what those other high speed cameras are, but the difference between a Phantom Flex and a "nearly as good as" other camera can be miles once you start really looking at the specs and images.