Pentamirror
Encyclopedia
Viewfinder
In photography, a viewfinder is what the photographer looks through to compose, and in many cases to focus, the picture. Most viewfinders are separate, and suffer parallax, while the single-lens reflex camera lets the viewfinder use the main optical system. Viewfinders are used in many cameras of...
systems of various single-lens reflex camera
Camera
A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...
s instead of the pentaprism
Pentaprism
A pentaprism is a five-sided reflecting prism used to deviate a beam of light by 90°. The beam reflects inside the prism twice, allowing the transmission of an image through a right angle without inverting it as an ordinary right-angle prism or mirror would.The reflections inside the prism are not...
. It is used to reverse again the upside-down and laterally reversed image coming from the reflex mirror.
Instead of the solid block of glass of the prism in pentaprism system, here 3 mirrors are used to perform the same task. This is cheaper and lighter, but generally produces a viewfinder image of lower quality and brightness.
This optical device is often (more precisely) referred to as roof pentamirror because of the roof-like ridge.