Canon New FD 100mm f/2.8

Canon redrew its entire FD lineup in 1979 and called it New FD. Same flange, same optical pedigree, but the breech-lock collar was gone, replaced by a bayonet you twist directly, and the barrels got lighter and slimmer. The 100mm f/2.8 was the quiet member of the short telephoto bench, sitting between the pricey 100mm f/2 (the premium fast portrait option, nearly double the money) and the macro 100. Canon needed a compact portrait tele that did not cost a paycheck, and the f/2.8 was it. Five elements in five groups, Super Spectra multicoated, light in the hand.

It is a small lens for what it does. Wide open at f/2.8 it is already sharp in the center, with the corners catching up by f/4 and everything biting hard by f/5.6. The rendering is the reason people keep these. Out-of-focus backgrounds go smooth and unfussy, no nervous edges, no harsh doubling on branches or specular points. Skin tones come through with the slightly warm, low-microcontrast signature that the FD primes share, which flatters faces and ages well on scanned negatives. Color is neutral leaning warm. Nothing clinical about it.

The classic use is head-and-shoulders portraiture on a film body, where 100mm on full-frame gives you working distance without the compression flattening a face into a pancake. It also doubles as a discreet candid lens and a light travel tele. Stopped down it handles landscape detail and architecture cleanly. The extreme corners tighten up as you close from f/5.6 toward f/8, so for a flat subject edge-to-edge you stop down a bit more before trusting them.

The honest limitation is speed. f/2.8 is fast enough for most portrait work but it is not the f/2, and on a dim afternoon you feel the difference in the finder and in your shutter speeds. Flare, contrary to the lens's vintage, is not the problem here. The Super Spectra coating holds contrast well and the lens does not flare easily; a strong direct source just outside the frame can still cost you a little snap, the way any old glass can, but this is no veiling-haze offender. Use the dedicated hood out of habit, not out of fear.

Today these go for pocket money. The lens nobody talks about is the lens you can still buy cheap, and a clean New FD 100mm f/2.8 undercuts the more famous 100mm f/2 by a wide margin while giving up almost nothing for portraits. Cross-shoppers usually weigh it against the Nikon 105mm f/2.5, the eternal benchmark in this slot, and the Canon holds its own on rendering even if the Nikkor wins the reputation contest. People buy it because it is small, sharp, and forgettable in the best way.

One metering note. The 52mm front thread is shared across a big chunk of the FD line, so an ND or a graduated filter you already own probably screws straight on. When you stack a strong ND for daylight long exposures, dial that filter factor into Zone Light Meter before you trust the reading; the app folds the correction into the metered combo so your f/2.8 portrait at golden hour does not come back two stops thin.