Canon 45mm 1.9 compared to 50mm 1.8

[Ted Town]

New member here, mostly SLR user, but occasionally a rangefinder makes its way to me.

So I was given this cool old Canon with the film advance trigger on the bottom. It has both shutter priority and full manual modes, although the selenium cells don't seem to be metering accurately. I'm not used to having shutter and aperture rings on the lens itself, which slows me done some, so I've been keeping an eye open for a Canon P.

Does anybody here have first-hand experience with how this lens compares with the 50mm f1.9 LTM? I'm not concerned with ultimate resolution in a 16 X 20 blowup, and maybe this more of a "horses for courses" situation, but were these built more for a hobbyist market than for someone who wanted interchangeable lenses?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Mackinaw]

I can't tell you much about the 45/1.9, other than it had five elements in four groups. This is from the Canon Museum website.

Jim B.

 

[Sonnar Brian]

The Canon 50/2.2 is also a five element design in four groups, a simplified double-Gauss.

CANON 50mm f/2.2 - Canon Camera Museum

Here, you can find out about Canon's S Lenses > 50-85mm > CANON 50mm f/2.2.

global.canon

I have this lens, is a fine performer. It is an uncommon lens, ~3,000 made.

 

[Ernst Dinkla]

I can't tell you much about the 45/1.9, other than it had five elements in four groups. This is from the Canon Museum website.

Jim B.

New member here, mostly SLR user, but occasionally a rangefinder makes its way to me.

So I was given this cool old Canon with the film advance trigger on the bottom. It has both shutter priority and full manual modes, although the selenium cells don't seem to be metering accurately. I'm not used to having shutter and aperture rings on the lens itself, which slows me done some, so I've been keeping an eye open for a Canon P.

Does anybody here have first-hand experience with how this lens compares with the 50mm f1.9 LTM? I'm not concerned with ultimate resolution in a 16 X 20 blowup, and maybe this more of a "horses for courses" situation, but were these built more for a hobbyist market than for someone who wanted interchangeable lenses?

Thanks in advance.

View attachment 4873484

A lens diagram I could not find for that Canon 45mm 1.9 but it resembles the one of Canon LTM 50mm 2.2 as I discovered taking it apart. More a Unilite than a Xenotar/Biometar type. I think the Canon LTM 50mm 1.8, a more typical double gauss type, should in theory be optically the better lens but you risk getting one with haze. Not that my salvaged Canon 45mm 1.9 of the first Canonet model was free from flaws, see the second link. I wonder wether your copy will give a similar OOF image, indicating an odd fabrication process or bad lens cement. The images I made, first link, show character more than perfection. However it started my interest in Biometar/Xenotar/Unilite type lenses. Today I received another example of that type fixed on a Fujica 35 ML rangefinder.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/threads/this-month-through-your-adapted-lens-february-2018.4254210/page-5

The willow images.

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/threads/point-light-tests.4676911/

 

[Coldkennels]

I think the Canon LTM 50mm 1.8, a more typical double gauss type, should in theory be optically the better lens but you risk getting one with haze.

For what it's worth: track down an early all-chrome one and you should be fine. It might still be hazy, but if it's early enough, the lubricants they used weren't as destructive to the glass.

I have a type 4 one - so late, but still early enough to dodge the nasty glass-etching-haze - and after cleaning a massive amount of haze and fungus out of it, it's actually one of the best lenses I own. It's a damn sight better, edge-to-edge, than the near-perfect collapsible Summicron that Skyllaney cleaned and fixed for me a while back.

One warning, though: when I got it, not only was it fungus-raddled, but it was mis-focusing quite noticeably. There was no sign of anyone having been in this before, so I think it left the factory like this. Two home-made shims behind the optical block solved that, but if I hadn't had the tools and a way of checking this, I would have been very disappointed in this lens!

A crop from the centre of frame after cleaning but before the shimming:


And after:


It's like looking at photos from two totally different lenses!

 

[rfaspen]

I also have a chrome era canon 50/1.8. It is as good as people say. Mine has perfect glass....I got it from original owner and feel lucky (also got some other canon lenses and a IVSB body). It's only apology is stiff focus and aperture ring. I should really get around to fixing that......I don't use it very much because of that and that's tragic.