My EX-3
 

Do you like my camera?

Ok, I'll bite. Did you break the viewfinder arm, or rebuild it?

you noticed!
 

Rebuild would be an overstatement, call it a modification

how did you drop it down so much?

..I want to know how ..... please...

It also begs the question, why?

HaHa...Maybe Ed just PhotoShoped it and he's playing with your head!
(At the very least, he voided his warrenty!!! HaHa..)
Hey Ed... When are you going to drop the front shocks and jack up the rear springs?

And what's with the black tape over the card slot door?

taping the card slot door is one of my favourite tricks, keeps the dust out when shooting in very dusty environments.

remember to exercise caution when removing that tape though, you might remove more than you bargained for....

"what's with the black tape over the card slot door?"


simple
keeps dust and dirt out.
I backed the tape with another piece of tape in the middle to keep it from sticking to the door. So the tape only sticks to the body around the door to seal out dust and dirt.

Remove the lens. Cap the lens port. Flip the camera upside down. Remove the plastic hatch (4 screws and 2 tabs) under the internal microphone.
You will now have access to the rod that the viewfinder is attached to.

There is a silver metal cam on that rod. It has 2 stops to restrict the rotation. I looked at this and saw plenty of extra wire to allow further rotation so I cut off the one stop on the cam with a dremel tool and small cutoff wheel. I taped over everything to control the dust from cutting. Didn't take much cutting to remove that tab.
Only problem I ran into was putting the hatch back on. It has 2 plastic tabs that were difficult to bend back into their slots.

There is plenty of wire to allow for this extra rotation.

Storage. I want to put this camera in a backpack. The viewfinder sticking up takes more room and can also get damaged that way. When packing away, I'll also remove the mic holder.

Also, I shoot inside car interiors and every bit of clearance helps.

Ed, can you use your MacBrook Pro as a monitor while shooting? If so, how is the picture quality?

haven't tried it

That is bloody brilliant. 2 questions. Why has Sony put in that extra stop? Why don't I have the courage to try for myself? Your ex3 looks like a sleek packable beast.

One never knows why Sony engineers do what they do! There is plenty of wire to allow for this extra movement.

Opening up that hatch wasn't too difficult. Closing it was. There are 2 plastic tabs on the hatch and 4 screws. The four screws alone will hold the hatch in. Not sure why the 2 plastic tabs are there in the first place. For some reason, mine now only has one plastic tab!

plastic tabs and very small screws are like socks in a clothes dryer. One always disappears ;-)

Nice camera hack - I had to look to see if it would be possible to put in a plug/jack system so I could really put the VF where I want, but it looks like too much work.
I did find on reassembly if you take the next piece toward the handle off it is easier to remove and put this plate back, no more tabs to mess with.

in that case, where's my screwdriver.

Ed,

Is it the sort of wire that you could cut and solder plugs to i.e. so you could make an extension cable and so increase your positioning options, or is it that flexible strip with printed wires?

Brilliant! I'd love to do that but I'm just too scared!

The wires are individual and loose in there. But plugs would start taking up a lot of room, there are a lot of wires. And I don't know what you would accomplish. There is enough slack to gain a good amount of additional position flexability. The only reason for plugs would be for removal of the viewfinder altogether. But every time you do, you'd be taking that hatch off which means taking the lens off first, etc. And pulling that rod completely out means even more mods.

Major surgery is really what would be needed to make the viewfinder removable. What I did was a very minor prochedure by comparison.

one small step for man one giant step for my ex3.

Alister, I had the same thought, and a viewfinder plug from the betacam would fit nicely in the hole where the EX3 finder rod now sits. But - so close and yet so far - there are too many wires in the bundle to reasonably get into. It would have been very simple for Sony, but that's water under the bridge.
Wouldn't it be great to put the viewfinder anywhere like RED?

Hi Ed,

Maybe a silly question but would this mod completely void your warranty?

Cheers,

Joe

I cannot say for sure.
But, COMPLETELY? I doubt it. For example; if the SxS slots failed, I seriously doubt they would void the entire warantee. The viewfinder has nothing to do with the SxS slot. If I have a VIEWFINDER problem, maybe they would find the fault might have been caused by the modification and disallow that claim.

But, you never know!!!!!

I'm getting up the nerve to give it a try!!

go for it! I am still waiting for a few, "I did it"s. (Slinking off to the yellow corner.)

It will invalidate any Prime Support contracts. It's in the contract small print. Any modifications to the camera or un-authorised repairs invalidate the Prime Support agreement. In the UK as this is sold as a professional product you don't have the same rights as a consumer with a consumer product, so beware!