Small-Format Cameras
Introduction
Small-format
cameras
Rangefmder
cameras
Often DMs are required to fill in for the duty photographer or to create and
duplicate slides. The camera you use for this work is most often a small-
format portable camera.
Small-format cameras refer to any cameras that produce negatives on a film
size of 35mm or less. Generally hand-held and portable, small-format
cameras allow maximum freedom of movement and large numbers of
exposures without reloading the camera.
The accessories, lenses, and flash
equipment are easily carried. The most popular professional small-format
cameras are the 35mm rangefinder and single-lens reflex (SLR).
Rangefinder 35mm cameras focus images on the film or focal plane after
diverting light reflected from surfaces through a series of angled mirrors.
The viewing lens and the lens through which the exposure is made are not the
same.
The difference between the offset position of the two lenses is called
parallax. What you see in the eyepiece is not necessarily what you record on
film. Most 35mm rangefinder cameras automatically correct any differences
in parallax.
Figure 7-8 shows how images pass through rangefinder cameras.
Figure 7-8.—How images
pass through a rangefinder
camera.
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