karwaiwesley wrote:
PSquared63 wrote:
The 5D has manufacturing tolerance problems with the mirror box and the focusing screen tray. People have had problems with manual focusing, because the focusing screen may not sit in the exactly correct position. You may need to place shims under the focusing screen to correctly position the focusing screen in the image path.

Hello,

This might come a bit late, I have some serious focusing issues with the EE-S screen that I installed yesterday. The focus is ever so slightly off when the lens is manually focused, it needs 1 or 2 degree turn (towards infinity) to the image to be tack sharp. I might have to build those shims. Anybody have info on this? =)

Much appreciated,
Wes

Did you try adjusting the diopter?

cogitech wrote:
karwaiwesley wrote:
PSquared63 wrote:
The 5D has manufacturing tolerance problems with the mirror box and the focusing screen tray. People have had problems with manual focusing, because the focusing screen may not sit in the exactly correct position. You may need to place shims under the focusing screen to correctly position the focusing screen in the image path.

Hello,

This might come a bit late, I have some serious focusing issues with the EE-S screen that I installed yesterday. The focus is ever so slightly off when the lens is manually focused, it needs 1 or 2 degree turn (towards infinity) to the image to be tack sharp. I might have to build those shims. Anybody have info on this? =)

Much appreciated,
Wes

Did you try adjusting the diopter?


Yes. I tried adjusting. It's definitely not my sight. Btw, I tried it on the 85mm 1.8 on AF, image turned out ok. But the image is definitely out on MF on the 85mm 1.8 and 60mm Leica that I have.

Wes

Some scotch tape on the inset edges of the screen may improve the situation.

cogitech wrote:
Some scotch tape on the inset edges of the screen may improve the situation.

That's a great idea! I'll try that out soonest. Bless you.

Wes

Scotch tape works well. Originally my current screen was very slightly off until I added a strip of tape around the edges.

The best target I found for these operations is one made up of vertical black lines, 1 pixel wide with 3 pixel spaces in between and printed at a minimum of 360 dpi. Makes it easy to see at a glance when your on focus viewing at 100%.

Kevin M wrote:
Scotch tape works well. Originally my current screen was very slightly off until I added a strip of tape around the edges.

The best target I found for these operations is one made up of vertical black lines, 1 pixel wide with 3 pixel spaces in between and printed at a minimum of 360 dpi. Makes it easy to see at a glance when your on focus viewing at 100%.

uncanny that you mentioned this target. 2 days ago, i used part of my window which had sharp vertical lines to confirm focus was off.

thanks!!
Wes

s23chang wrote:
R.H. Johnson

Please check with Bill Maxwell him self.

Bill Maxwell's contact

What exactly is the Bill Maxwell screen treatment?

Just posting an update about adding spacers/shims to the EE-S focusing screen. It made the focusing worse. This means that I have to shave off part of the EE-S screen to make manual focusing work. It's more trouble than it's worth, so I am just going to compensate manually whenever I am shooting.

Wes

karwaiwesley wrote:
Just posting an update about adding spacers/shims to the EE-S focusing screen. It made the focusing worse. This means that I have to shave off part of the EE-S screen to make manual focusing work. It's more trouble than it's worth, so I am just going to compensate manually whenever I am shooting.

Wes

Is there an original shim inside the camera that you could removed, and then work back to the right distance with scotch tape?

cogitech wrote:
karwaiwesley wrote:
Just posting an update about adding spacers/shims to the EE-S focusing screen. It made the focusing worse. This means that I have to shave off part of the EE-S screen to make manual focusing work. It's more trouble than it's worth, so I am just going to compensate manually whenever I am shooting.

Wes

Is there an original shim inside the camera that you could removed, and then work back to the right distance with scotch tape?

There seems to be a copper shim that looks pretty thin, I don't know how it's fastened on the to the mirrorbox. I have googled but found no instructions how it can be removed.

Any ideas? Much appreciated.

Wes

The shims are usually loose and often fall out of place when switching screens, but I am basing this on other bodies like the 10D, 20D, 300D, etc. I can't even remember if my 5D has a shim or not, or whether it was loose.

cogitech wrote:
The shims are usually loose and often fall out of place when switching screens, but I am basing this on other bodies like the 10D, 20D, 300D, etc. I can't even remember if my 5D has a shim or not, or whether it was loose.

I plucked out the shim using a thin blade. Applied 2 layers on the EE-S screen and shot the vertical lines Kevin posted. It works!! I am getting spot-on focusing now.

Thanks so much
Wes

Edited by karwaiwesley on Apr 14, 2008 at 04:37 PM GMT

Glad to hear that!

So now we all know that a 5D screen can be tweaked either way, by anyone, with this very simple method. I'd guess this would work with just about any 5D and any screen.

cogitech wrote:
Glad to hear that!

So now we all know that a 5D screen can be tweaked either way, by anyone, with this very simple method. I'd guess this would work with just about any 5D and any screen.

Glad to hear that too. Still waiting on my 5D, but the prospect of having to machine the thickness of an alternate screen rather than the simplicity of fine tuning focus with ultra light shim material had me a bit concerned.