Need help canon 50mm fd lens

[Nicolex86]

Hey, I recently just purchased an old dslr for $100.00 on eBay, I wanted to start getting into photography without braking the bank and if I stuck with it I was gonna go ahead and buy a new DSLR.. I recently purchased a 50mm 1.8 fd lens for my canon XT and I didn't realize it wasn't going to fit my camera so someone told me to buy an adapter and that I did the adapter has a glass also.. Anyway I've been hearing a lot that it's not worth it and image quality is terrible. I was wondering if anyone has pictures laying around that used an adapter so I can see the image quality? I bought the fd lens and adapter for 50 all together, is it worth it to just learning how to deal with it or should I go ahead and purchase a 50mm compatible with my camera? Thank you in advance!

 

[iolair]

Buying from scratch, yes it would have been better to just buy the modern EF 50mm 1.8. It's great value.

Unless it's a well-preserved original Canon adapter, the chances are that your FD to EF adapter will have poor quality optics and produce disappointing images. But you already have the camera, lens and adapter? Why not just experiment with it and see how you get on?

 

[TCampbell]

It's not just the image that's the problem... it's everything else. The FD lens (and I have one of these on my Canon AE-1) is mechanical, not electronic. The f-stop is controlled via mechanical levers. There's no automatic focus.

You may think that's the focus isn't a big deal, but in an SLR camera, there would have been a split-prism focusing screen that you see when you look through the finder. You adjust focus until the two "halves" are aligned and you've nailed the focus. A 35mm SLR has a very large focusing screen (like a "full frame" DSLR would have today) so it's big, bright, and it has a very large focusing aid.

Switch to your Canon XT... it doesn't have a split-prism finder. The focus screen is also much smaller and not as bright. This means it's going to be tough to eyeball the focus.

It would be better to just buy an EF 50mm f/1.8 lens (there's currently a $20 mail-in rebate on them which makes the lens about $104 right now and that's for a "new" lens.)