Page II
Kalart Camera
The Kalart Camera viewfinder mystery
The Luminous View Finder, exclusive with Kalart, introduces a revolutionary way to see the area covered by the film and to keep your subject under constant observation in full life size.
As you look through the view finder, you’ll notice that the small range finder image is surrounded by a much larger black area in which you will see four white lines forming a rectangle. The numerals in these lines-127– for example, represent the focal length of your lens in mm. Focusing should be done with one eye closed. After you have finished focusing, and with the closed eye still shut– fix your gaze on the four white lines. Make sure that all four are distinct. Now and without moving the position of the head or camera, open the other eye . As you do so, the white lines are "transferred" from one eye to the other and appear to be projected around the subject. The area within the projected white lines represents the area covered by the film. Thus you can observe the subjects action with full eye vision and keep your picture framed at the same time.
These pictures may help you to understand the unusual way of focusing with two eyes opened.
You'll notice a left and a right focusing window on the front side of the Kalart. On the opposite site, thus on the back, you'll find the two eye pieces. In the middle two smaller windows giving access to the incoming light which image shall be split by the range finder and projected on the black screen. On the back there is a switch to choose for the left or right eyepiece to look through. One other switch enables or disables the focus spot which is very helpful in dark circumstances. Two beams of light on the subject shows if the camera is in or out of focus.
On both outer sides of the eyepiece you'll find a chrome switch to control the solenoid which activates the shutter, but before doing that, it switches the light on from the focus spot.
Back side with the two eye pieces, left switch; "focus spot on / off". Right switch; "left or right use of eye piece." In the middle the bulb holder to change the bulb. Big screw to set flash ignition for different kind of flash bulbs. Smaller screw below to adjust coincident range finder.
When camera back removed, the left and right black screens are clearly visible (1). Here the left one.
On front of the screen, (2) you'll see the eyepiece with 45 degree mirror to focus with the aid of the built in range finder (3) beam splitter.