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Hacking an LCD viewfinder from old camcorder — Parallax Forums

Hacking an LCD viewfinder from old camcorder

TzvylTzvyl Posts: 4
in General Discussion
Hi

I have a Panasonic camcorder model :nv-rx33, still working.
The viewfinder works perfectly.
The viewfinder has a Sony CXA1854AR IC.
The LCD model is Sony LCX005BKB8.

The viewfinder is connected to the camera by a 7 wire connector.
Wires 6 and 7 are for the back light , the rest are for the video ,the lcd power and so on.
I have the LCD's data sheet, also the viewfinder datasheet.
I'm only an amateur ,so it doesn't help me a lot. but I can provide it to anyone who would like to help.
I would like to use the viewfinder independently, either as a monitor or to make a small video projector.
I'm attaching some photos.
Can someone help me please.
Thanks ahead.
Tzvyl
EVF 1.jpg
800 x 389 - 240K
SONY LCX005KB8B.jpg
766 x 306 - 185K
SONY CXA1854AR.jpg
800 x 680 - 489K
EVF Schematic.jpg
815 x 500 - 65K

Comments

  • PublisonPublison Posts: 12,366
    Welcome to the forums!

    Are you trying to interface with a Parallax product?
  • W9GFOW9GFO Posts: 4,010
    I did the same thing many years ago, before I knew anything about electronics. I wanted to make a head mounted display to use for monitoring the wireless camera on my helicopter.

    I found where the power fed into it and then by experiment discovered where the composite video fed into. Three lines, power, ground and video.

  • TzvylTzvyl Posts: 4
    W9GFO wrote: »
    I did the same thing many years ago, before I knew anything about electronics. I wanted to make a head mounted display to use for monitoring the wireless camera on my helicopter.

    I found where the power fed into it and then by experiment discovered where the composite video fed into. Three lines, power, ground and video.

    Thank you so much for your answer , I'm very sorry for responding just now.
    Is there any possibility for you to tell me which line is video and so on .
    Thanks
  • taterotatero Posts: 1
    I'm not an expert but I'm going to guess pins #1 and #2 are your video signal. The signal that the viewfinder uses is in all likelihood, Composite Video. This is the same as the yellow RCA plug in most TV sets. There are two signals, one for brightness and the other for color. Because pin #1 says "y" - I'm going to guess that's the luminescence (brightness) channel - since "y" is the normal shorthand for that signal component. The other says "mix" - which may refer to how color information is carried in the chrominance signal. These are just guesses but I do believe if you're only connecting video output to these connections (and not power) to test if the LCD renders video, you're probably safe to experiment. Good Luck!

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composite_video
  • TzvylTzvyl Posts: 4
    Thank you so much , I will try your suggestions

  • RS_JimRS_Jim Posts: 1,768
    Tzvyl,"
    Y,C video is what was first called "S" video in the video industry. By seperating Luma from Chroma it negated the need for color subcarrier, hence the color dot crawl. If the monitor is from a camcorder, it would very likely have Y,C video as that was what was being recorded. The video would be 525,60 or 625,50 depending on whether it was a U.S. standard machine or Europeian.
    Jim

  • TzvylTzvyl Posts: 4
    RS_Jim wrote: »
    Tzvyl,"
    Y,C video is what was first called "S" video in the video industry. By seperating Luma from Chroma it negated the need for color subcarrier, hence the color dot crawl. If the monitor is from a camcorder, it would very likely have Y,C video as that was what was being recorded. The video would be 525,60 or 625,50 depending on whether it was a U.S. standard machine or Europeian.
    Jim

    Thanks for your help !
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