Canon FD 35mm F3.5 S.C.
If you like your lens flares “spicy” look no further…
Canon FD 35mm F3.5 S.C. on my EOS R @ F3.5
This was lens that had not been on my radar until very recently. I have owned the FD 35mm F2 S.S.C. (both the radioactive thorium concave & non-radioactive convex front-element versions) since I started my FD lens “obsession” years ago. Those have been some of my favorite lenses for years on smaller sensors because of the crop-factor induced by APS-C & M4/3 sensors.
Now into the second month of self-isolation due to the current world situation, I decided to take a gamble on this lens after finding one at the ever so justifiable price of under $100. What intrigued me was the fact that this was one of the few FD lenses offered with the basic S.C. coating. After My recent experiences with the FD 135mm F2.5 S.C. lens I have become more interested some of the more basic FD lenses. All of which, including this lens, feature a common basic 6-element construction along with the simpler “S.C. - Spectra Coating”.
Canon FD 35mm F3.5 S.C. on my EOS R @ F3.5
I have to admit this is the slowest prime lens I have ever purchased. I generally make a point of not purchasing prime lenses with an aperture of smaller than F2.8 as I enjoy shallow depth of field. With this lens I broke that “rule” and I have to say I am kinda glad. This lens is very compact for a 35mm lens. It is basic in its optical construction, 6-elements in 6 groups. It has rather impressive close focus of 1.5ft or 0.4m which is quite decent for a relatively wide-angle vintage lens. The lens features a rather “basic” 6-bladed aperture.
Overall this lens has good resolution and contrast wide open and therefore produces decently sharp images even wide open. Due to the small front element the lens suffers from the “Cat’s Eye” effect with bokeh rather quickly, just a third of the frame from the center already shows the deformation of the rounded bokeh of the center into ovals. Longitudinal Chromatic Aberration is mostly well controlled, therefore Spherochromatism, magenta/green fringing before and after the plane of focus is not pronounced. Then again the lack of fringing is to be expected for a slower maximum aperture lens. Lateral Chromatic aberration is present but acceptable.
Overall rendering is quite nice, the lens has relatively “smooth” transitions from focus to defocused areas with no halo fringing around the Bokeh. Transition areas are mostly free of any “busyness”. There is an “average” amount of vignette overall wide open which does improve slightly stopping down as to be expected. There is a noticeable amount of barrel distortion toward the edges, nothing terrible, but certainly not impressive even for a vintage lens. The distortion is noticeable with straight lines at the edge of frame in real-world shooting.
Canon FD 35mm F3.5 on my EOS R @ F3.5
One “features” of this lens that hits you in the face pretty quickly is just how prone to extreme flaring it is! This can either be a terrible thing or a very cool “party piece” of the lens. With any bright light source within or just outside the frame the lens produces quite significant flaring and ghosting across most of the frame. The flaring is quite chromatic, producing bright red, orange, and sometimes magenta flares with point-spot ghosting artifacts and a bright red rainbow effect that is somewhat similar to the more “neutral” rainbow effects that I’ve seen with my FD 55mm F1.2 S.C.C. These flares are inevitable if you are shooting in any backlight situations. They are for lack of a better word, “spicy” and remind me of some of the flaring characteristics of some vintage Panavision lenses. If you like crazy flares you are going to love this lens, if you don’t, well let’s just say you should probably look elsewhere for a compact vintage wide-angle prime. I think this lens is fun but the amount of flaring it suffers from is definitely is a big limitation depending your expectations and shooting style.
