The CVF Series II is the new kid on the block, and deserves some special attention as to why it was developed in the first place.
For one, it is a critical focuser. The word 'critical' has a very special meaning. In photography, it is normally used in referring to a 'critical grain focuser'. Professional photographers have been using high magnification grain focusers for quite some time to inspect 35mm slides close up for details normally missed by the naked eye. The underlying premise is that if you can see an imperfection, you can fix it. And the same applies to the CVF - except that instead of fixing the image afterwards, it fixes things before even taking the picture.
Magnifiers for use with 35mm film cameras have been around for a long time. Most fall into either the category of smoke-stack magnifiers or microscopes attached in place of a camera's prism, or add-on attachments which magnify the image on the prism a few times over. Both methods fail in some key respects. They usually do not provide enough magnification, and if they do, the light loss from the process is tremendous. This leads to adding bright-screens and other items to try to overcome this. Overall, while some of these devices can look impressive, they really do not perform as well as expected.
With the new 35mm DSLR cameras, the situation does not get any better - and can even get worse. While low magnification right-angle finders for these cameras are better than nothing and necessary for overhead framing, the design quality is relatively terrible compared to those available for the older 35mm film cameras. If you have one, you already know its drawbacks. And DSLRs do not yet allow for interchanging viewscreens or easily attaching an effective auxillary device. And, forget about trying to magnify the pixels on the LCD viewscreen. You get bigger pixels to look at, but no better resolution. It's the same case using software and viewing on the monitor: you are limited by the resolution of the monitor itself.
Overall, all of the existing displays are under-pixelized for critical focusing, even with zoom features on the finder DSLRs. The CVF produces a resolutin below the resolution of the pixels on your chip!Overall, the new CVF overcomes the issues above by using high-power lupes in conjunction with very specially engineered BK7 glass focusing screens. Having been designed for critical focusing from the bottom up instead of as an afterthought, it is guaranteed to outperform any other 35mm focusing device available today. The image you see through it is really what you will get.
We think the CVF really is pretty special and hope you will too. Please feel free to write or call for more information anytime. And a really big thanks to everyone who helped us in its development. - Richard
