I have the Brightscreen split/microprism and love it. However, only evaluative metering work without exposure compensation. Something about the screen screws up the metering, at least some of the time with the other metering modes. With the histogram, it doesn't cramp my style too much and I love the split. With the combo of the split and confirm adapters, I find focusing the manual lenses fairly easy most of the time.
I had a Brightscreen in my 5D too, and have only good things to say about it. I had the large microprism-only version, though, and I found this perfect with MF Zeiss and Leica glass. I was shooting a lot of portraits then, and with the Apo 90/2 and shooting close up, I could see focus being pulled along a bottom lid. cheers, kl
I use the Canon E-es screen. Works great but gets really dark after f/2.8. There is a company that can add some coatings to reduce light fall-off, I will probably do this soon.
I also use the Ee-S screen. For me it's perfect, even with my f4-Leica-Varios. For me, it doesn't get too dark even at f4 (but I 'grew up' with MF and much darker finders). Split screens and/or microprisms may facilitate manual fosussing but I'm rather distracted (in terms of image composition) by these central structures. A plain matte screen makes image composition much faster and easier for me, also because I rarely focus on the center. With the Ee-S screen, the plane of focus is quite distinctly visible and cogitech put it nicely in the thread linked above by StevenPA:
A plain matte screen "is like having infinite AF points, with eye control".
I use the Ee-D screen (with grid) now. Contrary to the descriptions of this screen all over the net, it is not just an Ee-A with grid, but almost as contrasty as the Ee-S, ie well suited for manual focusing. Since the grid of the Ee-D helps me a lot while being still contrasty enough for manual focusing, it's my favorite over the Ee-S.
((If one is not sure about the difference in contrast (or brightness, rsp.) between the three screens named above, there is an easy test: Just take three pictures (identical scene and light) in A-mode with the same screen (whichever you want/have), one picture for each of the three screen custom settings (#00, were the 5D corrects for screen brightness), and compare the resulting three histograms! The Ee-D result is much closer to the result with Ee-S setting than to that of the standard Ee-A setting.))
http://www.slrdaren.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=65_71
look at the 3 at the bottom for the 5D but check the Canon listing for what is on the screeen as I thought I was gettting a split screen with microprism but it turned out only to be a split screen. Because of the center focus mark the split screen is not that useful. The matte part is much better than the Ee-s though and worth it for this alone.
prashant wrote:
is Ee-S really a great improvement over standard screen while using manual lenses? I have all my lenses with f2.8 or lower, may be interesting.
Yes it is. I use it on mainly 2.8 lenses and the 3.5 vario sonnar and it works like a charm.
prashant wrote:
is Ee-S really a great improvement over standard screen while using manual lenses? I have all my lenses with f2.8 or lower, may be interesting.
It is dramatically better. Don't even hesitate to try one.
I've used Bill Maxell's "Hi-Lux" Ee-S screen, and it is fantastic.
I don't have 5D now, but I'm saving the screen just in case I get the 5D again.
It's that good.
