FD to EF lens adapters

[pwp]

A relative has just chirped up and thought I may be interested in his pretty decent set of FD primes which he'll give to me. Nice offer! They've probably been unused but carefully stored for over 25 years.

I'm sure there is a huge range of FD to EF adapters all the way from eBay cheapies to gold-plated extravagances. The cheapies may be fine for all I know. Anyone using FD to EF adapters?

-pw

 

[Mikehit]

I looked at this a while ago but this article put me off:

http://photonotes.org/articles/eos-manual-lenses/

Either lose infinity focus or have an extra element in the path and degrade quality.

The wider angle lenses with their manual aperture control would probably make excellent macro lenses with a reversing ring.

 

[rs]

The flange distance of EF is longer than FD. This typically means either using a physical adapter which further extends this distance, meaning infinity is lost, or use an adapter with optical elements to counteract that, but then introduce a whole set of new problems.

However, there are solutions out there. Ed Mika (http://edmika.com) has made some excellent adapters which overcome these problems, but they are on a lens by lens basis, and really aren't worth pursuing on a cheap low quality FD lens.

 

[pwp]

I suspect I'm too impatient to go down this road. I'll suggest my relative puts them up on eBay as fabulous vintage Canon FD lenses.

-pw

 

[NorbR]

Unless you have anything from the M line (or a mirrorless camera from any other brand for that matter ...)
FD lenses work great on those cameras. Particularly with the M3, more suited for use with manual lenses.

 

[LDS]

However, there are solutions out there. Ed Mika (http://edmika.com) has made some excellent adapters which overcome these problems, but they are on a lens by lens basis, and really aren't worth pursuing on a cheap low quality FD lens.

These are conversion kits, not adapter, which requires to "modify" the lens (although they look reversible). That means disassembling and reassembling the lens (including the aperture, it looks).

EF-M cameras should be better adaptable to use FL/FD lenses, but being these fully mechanical ones, aperture and focusing will be manual only - and aperture control will require stopping down at the actual aperture. Other brands may use adapters as well, but again, unless the lens has a specific value, the effort may not be worth it.

A Canon FF mirrorless designed for EF lenses probably would not accept FD lenses as well (and Canon has very little reason to support the old ones, now thirty years old or so, it didn't back then...).

I prefer to enjoy my FD lenses on their FD cameras.

 

[tcmatthews]

The only cameras that can get good results out of FD primes are mirrorless. If you are really interested pick up a Sony A7 series or a crop mirrorless of your choice with a speed booster.

 

[pwp]

The only cameras that can get good results out of FD primes are mirrorless. If you are really interested pick up a Sony A7 series or a crop mirrorless of your choice with a speed booster.

Right! So it may be a simple matter to adapt them for use with my Panasonic GH4 with a FD to MFT adapter. Thanks.

-pw

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

A relative has just chirped up and thought I may be interested in his pretty decent set of FD primes which he'll give to me. Nice offer! They've probably been unused but carefully stored for over 25 years.

I'm sure there is a huge range of FD to EF adapters all the way from eBay cheapies to gold-plated extravagances. The cheapies may be fine for all I know. Anyone using FD to EF adapters?

-pw

If they are "L" lenses or some of the highly sought after models, get a Ed Mika adapter. He has a universal model that works with most FD / FL lenses. For run of the mill lenses, even a cheap EF lens is better.

As noted, they are easy to adopt to mirrorless, and by using just the center part of the lens, IQ is better as well.

 

[-1]

I got myself a Zykkor from Amazon, I think. It's basicaly an one element 1.3x TC. I intended it for my old FD 50/1.8 but that one lives most of it's time on a dumb FD to EFM adapter. In short: It's possible that it yields better results with other lenses. YMMV.