Creative optics .. 3rd party eye pieces, eye relief, etc. (1 Viewer)

[lee pseudogrammaton]

I just picked up a Vortex Viper 65mm spotter...

Quickly: The 18mm eye relief with the kit ep seemed marginal to me, but it *does* work with the 50mm "normal" lens on our DSLR. But it might not work with my daughter's Powershot G11.

So I find out, Vortex doesn't sell significantly better ep's for their Viper models, just significantly more expensive (a kit ep goes for $100).

Right, so looking at the Viper eyepiece mount, it's some proprietary collar that seats a standard 1.25" ep into the waterproof body. The collar & zoom ring are an extra 0.5" dia., threads onto the body's threaded mount, etc. Evidently it's all waterproofed.

So ... I'd rather have 24mm eye relief, available from other ep makers. And it appears to me that any 3rd party ep could be adapted using some PVC pipe, JB-Weld & Gorrilla Glue with a 3rd party 1.25" ep.

Is there something I've missed?

--LEe

 

[Neil]

I just picked up a Vortex Viper 65mm spotter...

Quickly: The 18mm eye relief with the kit ep seemed marginal to me, but it *does* work with the 50mm "normal" lens on our DSLR. But it might not work with my daughter's Powershot G11.

So I find out, Vortex doesn't sell significantly better ep's for their Viper models, just significantly more expensive (a kit ep goes for $100).

Right, so looking at the Viper eyepiece mount, it's some proprietary collar that seats a standard 1.25" ep into the waterproof body. The collar & zoom ring are an extra 0.5" dia., threads onto the body's threaded mount, etc. Evidently it's all waterproofed.

So ... I'd rather have 24mm eye relief, available from other ep makers. And it appears to me that any 3rd party ep could be adapted using some PVC pipe, JB-Weld & Gorrilla Glue with a 3rd party 1.25" ep.

Is there something I've missed?

--LEe

I'm not sure about the modifications but don't invest too much effort for the Canon G 11. The Canon G series lenses need a lot of ER to eliminate vignetting ( over 30 mms).
The 18 mms you have is enough for micro four thirds cameras and some nikons eg Nikon P330
Neil

 

[lee pseudogrammaton]

I'm not sure about the modifications but don't invest too much effort for the Canon G 11. The Canon G series lenses need a lot of ER to eliminate vignetting ( over 30 mms).
The 18 mms you have is enough for micro four thirds cameras and some nikons eg Nikon P330
Neil

Right. Well, the G11 works reasonably well (considering) by using its digital "teleconverter" feature. Since it holds manual presets, it can be pre-tuned for the scope. It's south of sharp, but it looks in focus.

As for the micro-4/3rds cameras, having interchangeable lenses they function much the same as a DSLR (some are in fact SLRs).

The problem, it appears, boils down to getting the interchangeable lens' entrance pupil as close to the front element as possible. Short zooms & primes seem to get decent results & my own best results have been using SLR macro lenses.