Canon FDn 50 mm f/ 1.4 Lens

Small, light, fast normal lens with good contrast and ok bokeh.

This lens is widely described as though it is the standard by which all other lenses should be judged, so I got one to test. The one I got was advertised as "clean," but has fungus on every internal element... which seems to be much more common for this lens than most -- about 1/4 of those I've seen advertised admitted to having fungus. In any case, the fungus has very little impact on image quality, so taking appropriate precautions against infecting my other equipment, I did some quick tests.

Around f/5.6, this lens is a winner: perfectly sharp with high contrast across the APS-C frame. At wider apertures, bokeh are better than average (much better than its f/1.8 siblings), but that seems to come from undercorrected SA, which also gives glow and low contrast wide open. Overall, it's a bit below average in IQ wide open. Of course, a bit below average is still darn good when talking about fast 50s.

Weaknesses:

Not really a great fast 50 when used wide open, so not very compelling.

Colors are a touch warm, but there's a significant shift on stopping down (probably due to SA).

Plastic FDn build.

Comments:

This is not a particularly special lens, but it usually sells for more than competing fast 50.