Brightscreens: Focusing Screens for the Canon 5D (and others)

I mentioned in previous posts about an issue I have with focusing and the Canon 5d. 1) I manually focus, 2) I wear progressive bifocals, and 3) the focusing screens that come standard with the Canon 5D (and I assume others) really don't help me a lot with my bifocaled vision.

After a lot of off-focused shots. many months of misery, and subsequent searching on the web for options and reviews, I decided to bite the bullet and buy a focusing screen from BrightScreens.

They come in a variety of styles, I wound up getting a simulated ground glass screen with a split image and microprism collar. It looks like the darker image to the right (note: the actual screen is clear, not dark, just in case you were wondering.)

In addition, they offer a variety of etchings that they can do on the screen. Like the actual focusing aids, there are a lot of options here as well, some more useful than others depending on what you shoot. I decided to have composition aid lines shown on the left added to mine. These lines, working with the focus points in my 5D, appear that they will be useful for composition.

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So, why the Brightscreen? 1) minimal loss of light were the reports on the web. Other screens, like a few those from Canon, were reported to go dark on lenses that were not f/2.8 or faster. 2) minimal impact on metering. Because of the variations in darkness, the screens impact what is actually seen by the meter. This can be adjusted in the custom functions, but varies depending on the screen you install. 3) reputation. Innovator in the field, long term company, and great reviews on the various forums. 4) the microprism and split screen. This was the biggest reason for me, because I needed the support to fine tune the focusing. 5) the "high price" of the screen is fairly cheap given the performance increase I am getting with my focusing. Don't let the price deter you, and besides these are "photography dollars" we are talking about, so nothing is really that cheap, remember?

Installation? Piece of cake. Open the camera, flip back a latch, use the clip to remove the old screen and put new screen in. For me it was perfect alignment. There were reports a few years ago about shims being needed for the 5d, but they have corrected that issue from what I can tell. All in all it was less than 3-5 minutes to swap out the screen.

Support / website / shopping? Their website is really difficult to muddle through, they have a new shopping site that is not all that better. As for shipping, mine arrived within the 7 business days they mentioned. They didn't send an email or tracking number though, it just showed up in a FedEx box on my door step one day. Support? Don't know, no issues so far. They have a product instruction sheet in the box, with a link to website page for updates. The website page was more up-to-date, so make sure you check that out for any last minute info.

Performance? Bifocals? After adjusting the diopter wheel on my camera, I've got to say that my confidence in a good focus with my camera has increased tremendously. I have used only in the studio, but with some of the extremely shallow depth-of-field tests I was doing last night, I was dead on in achieving the focus plane I wanted. Even with my progressive bifocals, I have an accurate view of the screen. The split-screen focusing is great, the microprism collar helps gauge focus areas that are not exactly in the center, and the "ground glass" remainder of the screen gives me good focus feedback as well.

I'm a happy camper with this new screen.

Did you find the answer you were looking for? If not, check out this recent blog entry. I am soliciting technical studio "problems" from readers to research and post results on the blog. You might have just the problem I'm looking for.

This blog entry is one of the Top 10 entries on the Rod and Cone.  Thank you for reading.  If you enjoyed it, please consider signing up for the blog via email.  This is for blog email purposes only, and I won't sell, trade, divulge, or abuse your email address.  --Brad Wiederholt

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