Q and street

Hi,

How do you manage to keep the Q always on to have it ready for a show without draining the battery fast? Having the monitor always on seems like a waste of it. I can obscure the monitor using the info button, but then the camera is not ready to shoot anyway (at least the monitor it is not)

Get a viewfinder and you don't need the monitor, save battery life and I like it better.

The Pentax one is a bit expensive but there are lots of old ones around that do a reasonable job. I have an old Braun Paxette one that is ok. It covers a range of focal lengths. I also have a Yashyca one that is quite nice. There was a discussion on the forum a little while back with lots of ideas floating about.

great! Do you have some links to the threads? Even to understand how to use those viewfinders.

A viewfinder needs to be matched with the focal length you are shooting with, so ideally only for a prime lens.

Setting instant review to off and toggling the info button will save you using the screen, though you will have to have your settings correct in advance as you won't be able to see any adjustments you make. If you set Auto Power Off to off then it will stay on and be ready to shoot after a period of inactivity.

thanks, that's what I ended up with, but I did not think about the view finder solution...I think I will never buy zoom for the Q...it's my prime walkaround . What is the viewfinder I should buy? Also it should not be expensive.

Here's one link

To match the 01 Prime the viewfinder needs a 47mm angle of view. The Pentax one is particularly bright and has accurate parallax correction marks for close ups and graticules for 1:1 and 4:3. I wish it had 3:2 though

Pentax one is expensive

There are alternatives, this problem was faced by early photographers, they go over it by using a frame 'peep' site, you see them on old pictures of press photographers, something like this.

http://thumbs2.ebaystatic.com/d/l225/m/m2nRqOQ97Z8wTeb0ztq1qdQ.jpg

Shouldn't be too hard to concoct something similar to fit into the hot shoe.

The modern equivalent is the 'red dot finder'. The project a red dot onto a semi-silvered screen, there's no magnification, but once calibrated the red dot always shows the centre of your frame superimposed on your view through the screen, they get rid of any parallax error. Note these don't send a laser beam onto your subject, just a dot onto their screen.

Two designs I've come across.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Red-Green-Electro-Dot-Sight-FIVE-Illumination-Levels-B...

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Red-Green-Electro-Dot-Sight-4-Reticles-5-Illumination-...

The problem with these is they don't show the edges of the frame and getting the adapter to fit them to the hotshoe can be hard to find, and they are quite large on a Q.

They are both well made with metal castings throughout, very rugged. I prefer the second one. The first one seems to be identical to the Pentax labelled product.