The new plastic MF mounts look very well designed.

Unfortunately they won't fit in either of my two MF viewers (one of which I just bought two
months ago) , nor will they fit in the Saturn viewers that are often brought to the NY 3rd
Friday stereo dinners. I have no problem putting one of my 132mm wide cardboard
mounts in a plastic sleeve and then viewing it in one of the delightful new Chinese
viewers, but there's no compatibility possible in the other direction. Those Saturn viewers
are a well established format, at least in my world.

While I have no doubt the price of these mounts is reasonable given their elaborate
design, I personally can't see spending $1.30 a piece for slide mounts that only fit in
certain viewers. When I used to shoot 35mm I would often spring for the more
expensive RBT mounts for slides I wanted to share in folios. I doubt I would have done
this if many of the folio members wouldn't have been able to fit those slides in their
viewers. I can only hope we might see some of these design innovations adapted to
mounts that will actually fit in the viewers many of us use.

Personally I would be the first in line to buy some of these mounts if they were available
in a 132mm width.


Jim Harp

--- In MF3D-group@yahoogroups.com, "jamesbharp" wrote:

>
> The new plastic MF mounts look very well designed.
>
> Unfortunately they won't fit in either of my two MF viewers (one of

which I just bought two

> months ago) , nor will they fit in the Saturn viewers that are often

brought to the NY 3rd

> Friday stereo dinners.

I understand your concern. The Regal-C you bought was specifically for
cardboard mounts, whereas the Regal-P is for plastic. It can be
modified if you find later you plan to use the 140s.

I have no problem putting one of my 132mm wide cardboard

> mounts in a plastic sleeve and then viewing it in one of the

delightful new Chinese

> viewers, but there's no compatibility possible in the other direction.

The cardboard mounts are not meant for the 3DWorld viewers and do not
fit properly in them. The center of the image is too low, and there
is no support on the back to stop the bottom from sliding into the
diffusor. You can make adaptors for them though, and both myself and
John Thurston provided instructions on how to do this when they first
came out.

Those Saturn viewers

> are a well established format, at least in my world.

It is regrettably a relatively small world. I suspect there were not
that many Saturn viewers made (100-200?), however to date there are
tens of thousands of viewers manufactured that take the 140mm mounts.
This number will only increase. 3DWorld has little interest in
accommodating a 3D community that only buys a few 100 mounts a year,
which is why I doubt they will ever manufacture 132 wide mounts. Bear
in mind 10 years ago everybody made their own viewers (see Robert
Thorpe's MF viewer pages).How difficult could it be to modify a wooden
viewer to use 140mm mounts?

One of the biggest concerns I had heard in the MF3D community was the
difficulty in mounting and the lack of a reliable source of mounts. To
me these new mounts solve both problems.

Sam

--- In MF3D-group@yahoogroups.com, "jamesbharp" wrote:

>
> The new plastic MF mounts look very well designed.
>
> Unfortunately they won't fit in either of my two MF viewers (one of

which I just bought two

> months ago)

Sorry Jim, it was a "Little Wonder" you bought and not a Regal. It is
possible to revise the LW, but nobody has inquired. If enough people
prefer a 140mm LW, I would pursue it.

Sam

SS wrote:

> I understand your concern. The Regal-C you bought
> was specifically for
> cardboard mounts, whereas the Regal-P is for
> plastic. It can be
> modified if you find later you plan to use the 140s.

I have yet to see one of the new "Plastic Mounts". The only
ones I have seen were the old ones (last year) that had the
aperture spacing wider than the interocular on the viewer they
were to be used in, and fell apart easily. It is nice that SS
could get improvements to them and at least get the aperture
spacing correct. To bad the outside dimensions could not be
adjusted to the present "standard".

I have totally missed the advantage of making the mount 140mm
wide; seems the 132mm was plenty wide enough. Centering the
image vertically in the mount only makes the area to be
written on smaller at the top and larger at the bottom. Not a
great advantage if at all. I can't see any other advantage to
the "New Size" other than an attempt to capture the whole MF
market.

> The cardboard mounts are not meant for the 3DWorld
> viewers and do not
> fit properly in them. The center of the image is
> too low, and there
> is no support on the back to stop the bottom from
> sliding into the
> diffuser. You can make adaptors for them though,
> and both myself and
> John Thurston provided instructions on how to do
> this when they first
> came out.
>

The problem, of course, is getting the "SS plastic mounts" to
fit in the viewers designed for 132mm wide mounts. Could it
be possible to cut 4mm off each side of the mount and trim the
bottom some as well?

> Those Saturn viewers
> > are a well established format, at least in my world.
>
> It is regrettably a relatively small world. I
> suspect there were not
> that many Saturn viewers made (100-200?), however
> to date there are
> tens of thousands of viewers manufactured that take
> the 140mm mounts.
> This number will only increase.

WOW!! "tens of thousands" is a large jump in MF enthusiasts
to use those viewers. I would have never suspected that such
an increase would happen. How did changing the slide width to
140mm do that?

Is there a quality "P" model viewer with adjustable focus on
the market? I can't use the plastic non-focusing viewers I
have seen.

> 3DWorld has little
> interest in
> accommodating a 3D community that only buys a few
> 100 mounts a year,
> which is why I doubt they will ever manufacture 132
> wide mounts.

I have been buying over 100 mounts a year myself (132mm wide).
What advantage does changing the mount width to 140mm have
that will (has) increased enthusiasm (and sales) for MF stereo
100X?

> Bear
> in mind 10 years ago everybody made their own
> viewers (see Robert
> Thorpe's MF viewer pages). How difficult could it be
> to modify a wooden
> viewer to use 140mm mounts?

The question is still "What advantage does 140mm mounts have
over a similarly constructed 132mm mount?"

>
> One of the biggest concerns I had heard in the MF3D
> community was the
> difficulty in mounting and the lack of a reliable
> source of mounts. To
> me these new mounts solve both problems.

Would they not have if they were 132mm wide? And not created
new problems doing so?

Chuck Holzner

I can understand Chuck Holzner's frustation at the new mount size,
but only up to a point. I am still going through the same sort of
frustration at the change from 4:3 ratio TV to widescreen, from
analogue TV to digital and film based cameras to digital. I didn't
ask for any of those changes and was happy with everything as it
was. In these cases, the standard is among hundreds of millions of
people. In our case, I think the number of about 100 individuals
was mentioned. If the standard was added to, or changed, is it such
a big deal? Our chosen hobby, because it is uncommon, has turned us
into a bunch of modifiers. I don't think that changing some
existing viewers to handle two different mounts types is going to
defeat us. For anyone who does not like the new mounts, then just
stick with the old ones.

The fact that the new plastic mounts were designed to different
measurements doesn't worry me greatly. With the price of the new
plastic viewers, it's easy to have a couple to cover both sizes.

We all have the freedom of choice to decide which ones we will use.
The old cardboard mounts will still be available. I have just
bought another 100 cardboard (half of which were defective) mounts
and 100 of the new plastic mounts. I don't see one as being a
better "standard" than the other. What I do see in 3D World is a
company that may well extend the life of our hobby for simply
choosing to make MF3D equipment and supplies in good numbers. With
that in mind, I am happy to support their new standard. It doesn't
have to replace the old standard. The two can coexist.

The one important thing to remember in all of this is the neither
mount size has much affect on the quality of the end image. That is
the part that matters, isn't it?.

Harry Calderbank
hcalderbank@ozemail.com.au

--- In MF3D-group@yahoogroups.com, "Chuck Holzner" wrote:
>
> SS wrote:
>
> > I understand your concern. The Regal-C you bought
> > was specifically for
> > cardboard mounts, whereas the Regal-P is for
> > plastic. It can be
> > modified if you find later you plan to use the 140s.
>
> I have yet to see one of the new "Plastic Mounts". The only
> ones I have seen were the old ones (last year) that had the
> aperture spacing wider than the interocular on the viewer they
> were to be used in, and fell apart easily. It is nice that SS
> could get improvements to them and at least get the aperture
> spacing correct. To bad the outside dimensions could not be
> adjusted to the present "standard".
>
> I have totally missed the advantage of making the mount 140mm
> wide; seems the 132mm was plenty wide enough. Centering the
> image vertically in the mount only makes the area to be
> written on smaller at the top and larger at the bottom. Not a
> great advantage if at all. I can't see any other advantage to
> the "New Size" other than an attempt to capture the whole MF
> market.
>
> > The cardboard mounts are not meant for the 3DWorld
> > viewers and do not
> > fit properly in them. The center of the image is
> > too low, and there
> > is no support on the back to stop the bottom from
> > sliding into the
> > diffuser. You can make adaptors for them though,
> > and both myself and
> > John Thurston provided instructions on how to do
> > this when they first
> > came out.
> >
>
> The problem, of course, is getting the "SS plastic mounts" to
> fit in the viewers designed for 132mm wide mounts. Could it
> be possible to cut 4mm off each side of the mount and trim the
> bottom some as well?
>
> > Those Saturn viewers
> > > are a well established format, at least in my world.
> >
> > It is regrettably a relatively small world. I
> > suspect there were not
> > that many Saturn viewers made (100-200?), however
> > to date there are
> > tens of thousands of viewers manufactured that take
> > the 140mm mounts.
> > This number will only increase.
>
> WOW!! "tens of thousands" is a large jump in MF enthusiasts
> to use those viewers. I would have never suspected that such
> an increase would happen. How did changing the slide width to
> 140mm do that?
>
> Is there a quality "P" model viewer with adjustable focus on
> the market? I can't use the plastic non-focusing viewers I
> have seen.
>
>
> > 3DWorld has little
> > interest in
> > accommodating a 3D community that only buys a few
> > 100 mounts a year,
> > which is why I doubt they will ever manufacture 132
> > wide mounts.
>
> I have been buying over 100 mounts a year myself (132mm wide).
> What advantage does changing the mount width to 140mm have
> that will (has) increased enthusiasm (and sales) for MF stereo
> 100X?
>
> > Bear
> > in mind 10 years ago everybody made their own
> > viewers (see Robert
> > Thorpe's MF viewer pages). How difficult could it be
> > to modify a wooden
> > viewer to use 140mm mounts?
>
> The question is still "What advantage does 140mm mounts have
> over a similarly constructed 132mm mount?"
>
> >
> > One of the biggest concerns I had heard in the MF3D
> > community was the
> > difficulty in mounting and the lack of a reliable
> > source of mounts. To
> > me these new mounts solve both problems.
>
> Would they not have if they were 132mm wide? And not created
> new problems doing so?
>
> Chuck Holzner
>

--- In MF3D-group@yahoogroups.com, "hcalderbank" wrote:

> We all have the freedom of choice to decide which ones we will use.
> The old cardboard mounts will still be available. I have just
> bought another 100 cardboard (half of which were defective) mounts
> and 100 of the new plastic mounts. I don't see one as being a
> better "standard" than the other.

The only internationally recognised standard in MF3D is actually 6x13,
for over 100 years. It was derived from taking the standard European
plate size of 18x13 and cutting it into 3 pieces.

I am curious: Where did you buy defective mounts Harry, and what was
wrong with them?

Sam

Sam Smith asked:

> I am curious: Where did you buy defective mounts Harry, and what was
> wrong with them?
>
> Sam
>

The defective mounts were the black cardboard landscape 50 x 40 mounts
from 3dstereo. The right edge of the right aperture on the viewing
side had a very bad curve in it. I have just been in touch with
3dstereo and they have discovered all of their stock of landscape
mounts to have this fault. They have promised to send me replacements
a little later in the year when they are available. I have since
noticed a similar problem on the panorama mounts but it's not as bad
and I can live with that given the short length of the right hand
edge. On the larger aperture it was very noticable.

Harry C.
hcalderbank@ozemail.com.au