An Evaluative Study of Three Photographic Focusing Screens under Two Levels of Illumination
The purpose of this experiment was to evaluate the ability of photography students to focus a camera accurately under two levels of illumination (high/low) with three types of focusing screens (plain groundglass, split-image and microprism). The participants were required to focus each screen three times under each light level; scores were focus errors in feet. A 2 × 3 MANOVA design was used, and post hoc comparisons were made for plain vs. split-image, plain vs. microprism, and plain vs. microprism and split-image combined. There was significantly less focus error (p < .05) under the low illumination level, but no significant difference between screen types across both light levels. The screen type X light level interaction was much higher than the p .05 required in this study. Plain groundglass produced the least overall error; microprism yielded the least error under low illumination and the highest error under high illumination; and split-image was the most accurate under high illumination and the least accurate for the low light level condition.