Hi, I am new to this site and hope I am in the right section. I had an opportunity to purchase several lens which are not Canon Digital lens. I am not an expert on lens so I don't know the correct terminology for the type of lens mount. But these do not have the electronic contacts on the back. Instead they have levers(?). I have purchased a couple of adapters and they seem to work fine with these lenses. My question is: Is there a universal adapter which should fit most (if not all) of these "lever" style lens so they could be used with my Canon EOS Rebel T5 camera? I am not a professional photographer. I love my Rebel T5, though. It has taken amazing photos for what I want. I hope I have made some sense with this. Thanks for any helps or ideas.
Hello and welcome to the canon forums Sheila! I moved this to the accessories thread since its about adapters for lenses. As you found there are definitely options to mount lenses that are from other mounts to your camera. Unfortunately you will not find something to be a universal answer. From mount a physical connection each mount can have a completely different mount shape especially across different brands,, in fact some use a screw threading on older lenses. The lever locations can be different even. As well as electronics on newer lenses ones wont talk from a canon to a Nikon mount for example even if it could be connected. Here is a canon FD lens if you compare to a Nikon or a Pentax they physically will be different. Then there is an issue of flange distance. The distance from the mount to the sensor/film plane. This complicates this because it impacts the focus ability and determines if you can even achieve infinity focus. You can adapt larger lenses from a camera with a larger flange distance but it does not work well the other direction. This even happens in modern lenses from the same company. The EF-s Lens is smaller and has a closer flange distance, so even if you can mount on a full frame camera which only takes the EF lens. There would be no infinity focus, as well as the sensor is bigger than the actual image area provided by the smaller lens so it would have a dark ring around it. There are physical issues with EFS on EF mount, while the mount shares much of its connectivity allowing some lenses to actually physically mount on some cameras, they can damage the camera if you mount an EFs on an EF body, because the lens protrudes further into the body and gets it the way of the mirror if nothing else. The shared mount design also allows the larger EF lenses to work on all crop bodies with zero issues. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flange_focal_distance All this is to say, you need to identify the lens brand and mount (usually pretty easy from the lens itself) and get a specific adapter that mounts that on your camera. So in the case above since you have a APC as long as your converter is to Canon mount EF or EFs it will work with your rebel, however you will need a separate one for each lens type you are trying to mount. You will probably find converters will stay in full frame conversions generally, 35mm film is the same as full frame digital. So all they need to do for canon FD for example is make one canon FD to EF converter and any canon dslr will be able to use it.
Johnsey, Thank you so much for the information. I was afraid I would need a separate adapter for each lens; but I feel the lens I got are worth the investment. Is there a site that would make my search easier or will I need to just search lens by lens?
A site like this may help you by providing a quick reference of several common lens mounts. https://wycameras.com/blogs/news/35mm-slr-lens-mount-identification-guide-1 Generally you should have all the info you need is on the front of the lens... FD lenses are labeled FD mount, or for example SMC Pentax M and A if you look into them are the PK or bayonet mount. Just a little googling will help identify most lenses. You can always ask about a specific lens if your having trouble with it. Good news is there are only so many mounts out there so you probably will only need a few adapters depending on ho many lens brands you are playing around with.
