On the back side, things are a little crude on the outside, but inside…state of the art. That pitiful looking viewfinder allows the operator to see an optical image on a ground glass screen. Like the image on the Iconoscope tube (right), it is also inverted and backward meaning panning left with the camera would make the image center move to the right, tilting up would make the image center move down, and so on. On the left, you can see the rear of the Iconoscope tube but the image shown on the right could not be seen from there as the receiving surface faced the lens on the front of the camera.
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