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The weirdest thing was, one day I had excellent far sight, with some trouble reading, and in what seemed like weeks, it changed to where the optician says I don't need glasses for reading, and I'm definitely unable to read signs without my glasses. It kinda ruins manual focus in anything but an old film camera that has a split/micro prism :(
 
i am in the same boat koffiejunkie, my eyesight is the pits! mine is due to strange astigmatism that likes to change at the drop of a hat. i've noticed though that most of my focus problem has to do with the way my glasses sit with accordance to the viewfinder. when i press my eye to the viewfinder it sits my glass just slightly off which in turn completely funks up my sight which makes it difficult to focus in manual. everyone that wears glasses has a astigmatism, some worse than others, that is why when you get your new glasses made the doctor always does measurements on your eyes, it is to get the correct alignment in the lens for your astigmatism. i have found that if you wear glasses that are more flush with your face it makes it easier to focus through the viewfinder. my regular glasses are small and square shaped and are a pain when it comes to looking through the viewfinder, however my reading glasses are a bit larger and more flush with my face and they work very well with my viewfinder.
there are magnifiers and diopters out there as well as eye cups designed for people who wear specs but i have yet to find a place here in s.a. that sells them. b & h sells them and they are not too pricey at all and people with poor eyesight say they really do work for them so perhaps that might be an option for you, either that or you may want to look at the design of your specs that you wear.
 
My 40D has the diopter built in. The Pentax K100D Super has it too, and the old man really loves it!
 
koffiejunkie said:
My 40D has the diopter built in. The Pentax K100D Super has it too, and the old man really loves it!
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Most of the canons do - my eldest keeps fiddling with the one on my 400D.
 
my d60 has one as well built in but even with my sorry eyesight it still does not help me very much.
 
koffiejunkie said:
The weirdest thing was, one day I had excellent far sight, with some trouble reading, and in what seemed like weeks, it changed to where the optician says I don't need glasses for reading, and I'm definitely unable to read signs without my glasses. It kinda ruins manual focus in anything but an old film camera that has a split/micro prism :(
Click to expand...

binkybozo said:
i am in the same boat koffiejunkie, my eyesight is the pits! mine is due to strange astigmatism that likes to change at the drop of a hat. i've noticed though that most of my focus problem has to do with the way my glasses sit with accordance to the viewfinder. when i press my eye to the viewfinder it sits my glass just slightly off which in turn completely funks up my sight which makes it difficult to focus in manual. everyone that wears glasses has a astigmatism, some worse than others, that is why when you get your new glasses made the doctor always does measurements on your eyes, it is to get the correct alignment in the lens for your astigmatism. i have found that if you wear glasses that are more flush with your face it makes it easier to focus through the viewfinder. my regular glasses are small and square shaped and are a pain when it comes to looking through the viewfinder, however my reading glasses are a bit larger and more flush with my face and they work very well with my viewfinder.
there are magnifiers and diopters out there as well as eye cups designed for people who wear specs but i have yet to find a place here in s.a. that sells them. b & h sells them and they are not too pricey at all and people with poor eyesight say they really do work for them so perhaps that might be an option for you, either that or you may want to look at the design of your specs that you wear.
Click to expand...

Also wear glasses :( But I am getting my new contacts in the next week or so. I have not played around with manual focus a lot so I have no idea how badly I will be off :( I must however learn to use it as the D60 doesnt have the internal motor for autofocus and I am a poor student thus can not afford the pricy lenses yet :p
 
koffiejunkie said:
. It kinda ruins manual focus in anything but an old film camera that has a split/micro prism :(
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My eyes have deteriorated in 6months from no reading glasses to reading glasses. You should see how my handwriting has changed as well lol :(

I have been looking out for a focusing Screen that has the split/micro prism. I found this but I have not ventured any further. Has anybody tried something like this? http://www.katzeyeoptics.com/page--Custom-Focusing-Screens--store.html
 
BeatleJuice said:
I have been looking out for a focusing Screen that has the split/micro prism. I found this but I have not ventured any further. Has anybody tried something like this? http://www.katzeyeoptics.com/page--Custom-Focusing-Screens--store.html
Click to expand...

I've been looking at that myself. I have read good things about their screens, but there is one potential caveat: The prism *might* affect spot metering. How much of a difference this makes in real life is unclear, and I don't use spot metering all that much, so I'm definitely going to try it. It's just not at the top of my to-spend-money-on list at the moment.
 
I just got my 18-55mm lens now. Had to get it from orms because SAcamera didn't have stock. Camera will arrive by Monday or so.
 
BeatleJuice said:
My eyes have deteriorated in 6months from no reading glasses to reading glasses. You should see how my handwriting has changed as well lol :(

I have been looking out for a focusing Screen that has the split/micro prism. I found this but I have not ventured any further. Has anybody tried something like this? http://www.katzeyeoptics.com/page--Custom-Focusing-Screens--store.html
Click to expand...
The big thing to me is what is your subject matter? Landscape stuff no probs with the split screen. As soon as you get into the telephoto end, especially with slower lenses, the split screen turns into a black blob in the middle of your viewfinder (especially if you're sukkeling with your eyes). On my film cameras (Minolta X700) I actually turfed the split screen focussing screens and replaced them with plain screens.
 
Soooon il be recieving my 450D+18-55 kit lens (supposed to be relatively good), from there i may buy the 55-250IS (or the Sigma 70-300 :/ maybe even the canon 70-300IS who knows), and then later for wildlife purposes a lens such as the sigma 150-500 or something similar if everything goes according to plan ;). Maybe the nifty fifty as well sometime.

any suggestions? The 18-55 + 55-250 seems like a good starter kit.. Had been planning on gettign a DSLR for a while now finally plans starting to come into action ;). Still relatively new to the world of DSLRs tho been reading a LOT esp on the POTN forums
 
BigAl-sa said:
The big thing to me is what is your subject matter? Landscape stuff no probs with the split screen. As soon as you get into the telephoto end, especially with slower lenses, the split screen turns into a black blob in the middle of your viewfinder .
Click to expand...

This is very true, however they claim with the Katz split screen that they have overcome most of these problems.
It would be nice to see an independent review of this focusing screen.
 
BigAl-sa said:
The big thing to me is what is your subject matter? Landscape stuff no probs with the split screen. As soon as you get into the telephoto end, especially with slower lenses, the split screen turns into a black blob in the middle of your viewfinder
Click to expand...

I didn't know that. Is this only true for split screen or microprism too? (TBH, I'm not entirely sure what the difference is - K1000 has a microprism, I don't think I've ever use a split screen before). Longest lens I've ever had on my K-1000 is the 28-210.
 
koffiejunkie said:
I didn't know that. Is this only true for split screen or microprism too? (TBH, I'm not entirely sure what the difference is - K1000 has a microprism, I don't think I've ever use a split screen before). Longest lens I've ever had on my K-1000 is the 28-210.
Click to expand...

I think split screen and microprism are one and the same.
One seller on ebay sells the K-1000 screen for the K10d and K20d.
Here is some interesting reading.
Katz Eye vs. Haoda vs. Chinese eBay focus screen
http://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/...eye-vs-haoda-vs-chinese-ebay-focus-scree.html

I never found darkening of the prism to be that much of a problem either on my film cameras.
 
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