Canon Pellix

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The Canon Pellix was a 35mm single lens reflex camera introduced in April, 1965 by Canon. It used the Canon FL lens mount and featured stop-down TTL metering using CdS photocell technology.

The camera was unique in that it used a very thin (0.02mm), stationary Mylar film beam-splitting mirror to feed the image to the viewfinder instead of the usual swinging reflex mirror. This avoided the mechanical complexity, noise and vibration of the moving mirror and allowed viewing the image at the instant of exposure.

However, this approach resulted in the following compromises: First, the exposures had to be increased because approximately 1/3 of the light coming through the lens never reached the film, it being redirected to the viewfinder. Second, as a corollary to the first, the viewfinder was not as bright as conventional reflex cameras. Third, image resolution was compromised to some degree by the existence of the beam-splitting mirror between the lens and the film plane during the exposure. Finally, under some circumstances, there may have been a chance that light coming through the viewfinder would affect the image. This was because the viewfinding system was not blocked off at the time of exposure as it is in the conventional single lens reflex camera by the swinging reflex mirror.

Complete specifications for the camera can be found at the Canon Camera Museum at the following URL: http://www.canon.com/camera-museum/camera/1955-1969/data/1965_prx.html

Canon SLR cameras
Mount Type	Series	Model
FL		FX (1964), FP (1964), Pellix (1965), FT QL (1966), Pellix QL (1966), TL (1968)
FD		FTb (1971), EF (1973), TLb (1974), TX (1975)
	F	F-1(1971), F-1n (1976), New F-1 (1982)
	A	AV-1 (1979), AT-1 (1978), A-1 (1978), AL-1 (1982), AE-1 (1976), AE-1 Program (1981)
	T	T50 (1983), T60 (1990), T70 (1984), T80 (1985), T90 (1986)
EOS	1	EOS-1 (1989), EOS-1N (1994), EOS-1N RS (1995), EOS-1V (2001),
		EOS 650 (1987), EOS 620 (1987), EOS 750QD (1988), EOS 850QD (1988), EOS 630QD (1989), EOS RT (1989), EOS 700QD (1989), EOS 10sQD (1990), EOS 1000F (1990), EOS 100 (1991), EOS EF-M (1991), EOS 5/5QD/A2/A2e (1992), EOS 1000FN (1992), EOS 500 (1993), EOS 888 (1993), EOS 50 (1995), EOS 500N (1996), EOS 3 (1998), EOS 88 (1999), EOS 300 (1999), EOS 30 (2000), EOS 3000N (2002), EOS 300V (2002), EOS 3000V (2003), EOS 30V (2004), EOS 300X (2004)
		Canon DSLR cameras
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