lens question?

[mistakendavis]

i am using a canon 2000 right now and was looking at buying a digital slr body, my question is how does the 35mm lens look if i were to use it on a digital body, i know they make digital lenses but i am a poor college student and was thinking if i can use my old lens that would be great.

 

[Rainman]

I don't have a digital SLR yet, but generally there is an effective magnification increase when using a 35 mm lens on a digital due to the smaller image capture area vs a 35 mm film frame. This factor varies by brand but generally seems to be 1.5-1.6 with some a little higher.

Canon's website, for instance, describing the EOS Digital Rebel's compatibility with existing EF lenses says:

Designed exclusively for the EOS Digital Rebel, the new EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 lens offers precision and quality. It is compact, lightweight, and covers the standard zoom range of approx. 28-90mm (in 35mm format) with smooth operation and superb resolution.

That makes the factor somewhere around 1.6. So a 100 mm lens would magnify like a 160 mm telephoto when used on a digital.

 

[danalec99]

yup...multiply it with 1.6

 

[Big Mike]

All of Canon's EF lenses will work on any of the Digital EOS bodies. The EFS 18-55 is a special lens designed especially for the Digital Rebel. This lens will not work on other EOS bodies because it's backspace is not enough to clear the typical EOS mirror.

While any EF lens will work fine with the digital bodies (plus the 1.6 magnification factor), the older, cheaper lenses did not have an anti-reflective coating on the rear element. This becomes and issue with digital because light can bounce off of the sensor and then back off the rear element. This may not be a huge problem though.

So ya, you can use your current EF lenses.