As mirrorless cameras get popular we’re seeing old manual lenses springing back into life more and more as budget options (even though 2.8 isn’t exactly low budget), for telephoto it’s particularly teasing to be able to use them on stabilized sensors, so I figured it’s worth sharing the experience I have with some of those lesser used lenses. This is a long term review of the FD 300mm 2.8 fluorite after 10 years using it first on the aps-c Canon 450D and later on the m4/3 Olympus EM5.
Canon FD 300mm 2.8 fluorite mounted on the Olympus EM-5
Relevant specifications, taken from Canon:
Release date: 1975
Diaphragm blades: 9
Minimum focus distance: 3.5m
Length: 230mm
Weight: 1900g
Short version: image quality is great in real life shooting, surprised me how glowy it looked after shooting a test chart, and usability is difficult because of how long the focus throw is. I don’t recommend it for general birding but it will be fine if you intend to shoot around feeders mostly.
On this review I also tested it on a Fuji XT-2 and I can’t explain for sure why the quality was so different in it, I haven’t completely ruled out shutter shock in the EM5 even testing with 4 seconds of anti-shock and I’d like to test it on a m4/3 with electronic shutter to be sure. I’ll leave the Olympus EM5 100% crops under the video so you can judge for yourself without the YT compression.
You can check the full review on:
100% crops from the resolution test (click to view larger), these were taken RAW and processed with default LR settings
F2.8
F4
F5.6
F.8
This is a very nice video review and post
Hey! Love your video & the amazing photos you captured. I have a Canon FD 300 2.8 L & was just wanting to know which adapter yuh used
Thank you, I have only dumb cheap adapters, one is called Dollice and another is Kiwi, EF-M43 (as my 300mm mount was converted to eos)