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Lens: Canon 35mm f/2.8 bellows lens

Vintage: 1980's

Lens Mount: RMS

Needed Adapters: I use an RMS to T-mount adapter and a T-mount to Nikon adapter, easily available on eBay

Preferred Mounting: Normal, not reversed

Filter Thread: None

Street Price: $250 - $500 in good used condition. Prices vary a lot online, shop around.

Controls: Aperture setting

Aperture: 9 blades

Basic Function: Requires a bellows to set focus and magnification

Extension Magnification Working Distance
adapters 1.32 55 mm
25 mm 2.05 45 mm
5 cm 2.57 38 mm
9 cm 3.69 35 mm
13 cm 4.82 33 mm
19 cm 6.54 31 mm
Est. Focal Length: 35.3 mm

Appearance:

Canon 35mm bellows top view Canon 35mm bellows side view

aperture graphResolution vs. Aperture:

This lens is at its sharpest at f/4. For the focal length and expected magnification range, the relatively large sharpest aperture will provide sharp and detailed images.

The most detailed aperture is also f/4.

corner sharpness graphCorner Sharpness vs. Aperture:

There is a minimal peripheral fuzziness seen at f/2.8. At all apertures above this, the field is extremely flat, less than 5% across the board.

This testing was performed at the minimum bellows extension, about 2.6:1. These numbers will tend to improve as the magnification increases and worsen when the lens is mounted directly on a camera.

resolution graphSharpness and Resolution vs. Magnification:

This lens produces very sharp and detailed images from a magnification of 1.3:1 to almost 7:1. Very few lenses will outperform this lens in the lower magnification range.

At the high end of the magnification range, shorter focal length lenses will tend to outperform this lens. The increase in resolution with these other lenses will come at the expense of shorter working distance.

The corner sharpness is extremely good on a bellows. This lens can also be used directly on the camera although the corner sharpness suffers a little at the lowest magnification. If you mount it directly on a camera without extension, you may benefit from stopping the lens down to f/5.6 instead of f/4 to improve the corners.

performance:sharpness graphPerformance: Sharpness vs. Magnification:

I have 4 lines that represent levels of performance from outstanding (top) to fair (bottom). This shows where this lens fits into the hierarchy that I have created.

The Canon 35mm shows sharpness performance that varies from outstanding at the low-end to good at the high-end of its magnification range.

performance:resolution graphPerformance: Sharpness vs. Magnification:

I have 4 lines that represent levels of performance from outstanding (top) to fair (bottom). This shows where this lens fits into the hierarchy that I have created.

The Canon 35mm shows resolution performance that varies from outstanding at the low-end to fair at the high-end of its magnification range.

resolving power graphResolving Power vs. Magnification:

This graph represents the smallest details that are able to be resolved by this lens at various magnificaitons. If the number doesn't get smaller as the magnification rises, there is little benefit to going up in magnificaiton with this lens. This situation is also called empty magnification.

Good resolution, although the improvements slow down in the upper magnification range - probably related to the aperture setting of f/4.

lateral CA graphChromatic Aberration:

This lens show minimal color fringing in the center (about 0.10 - 0.20 pixel) and mild/moderate on the periphery (0.010 - 0.084%). Anything below 0.04% is not considered significant. Above 0.08% is considered moderately visible. The moderately visible fringe is only seen at the highest magnification.

There is mild axial CA on out-of focus details (see image below) as shown by a slight red fringe on the right and a slight green/cyan fringe on the left of the image.

Longitudinal CA:

axial CA

Image Contrast: Image contrast is very good, typical for high-quality bellows lenses.

Flare: This lens shows no significant flare during testing.

Distortion: This lens shows no significant distortion during testing.

Image Samples:

About 2:1 magnification, f/4, focus stack of 17 images, resized:

sample image

crop imagePixel level crop from the image above:

There is very good pixel level detail, no problems.

About 4.5:1 magnification, f/4, stack of 26 images, resized:

axial CA

crop imagePixel level crop from the image above:

There is good pixel level detail, no problems.

Conclusion:

This is a bellows lens that performs extremely well from 1.3:1 to about 7:1. The sharpness and resolution are about as good as you will see from 1:3:1 to 3:1 and good to very good above that. That detail does come with somewhat limited working distance, but more than adequate for most purposes. The field is extremely flat at all except the lowest magnification (mounted directly on the camera, no extension). The chromatic aberration is low to moderate, minimally visible at all but the highest magnification. The contrast is good, typical for a bellows lens.

Overall this lens is hard to beat for a medium focal length bellow lens. It is commonly available on the internet(used camera stores and eBay)for a moderate price (no higher than other bellows lenses). This lens has an RMS mount that is easy to adapt to all camera bodies with a few commonly available adapters. there is little not to like about this lens and I highly recommend it.