In the history of film cameras every so often a manufacturer comes up with a winning design. They then refine that design over many generations of the same camera upgrading every few years with the latest technology. The result is a highly refined model packed with features, and with most limitations ironed out. The Canonet is a great example of this.
The Canonet was designed as a relatively small camera with a high-quality lens and a good set of specifications that would appeal to both professional photographers (needing a companion camera to their big heavy kit), and to serious enthusiasts who wanted a top-quality camera with a strong set of features.
| The Canonet G-III( left) and 'New Canonet'. Effectively the same camera. | 
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What is a Canonet ?
Firstly it is a rangefinder camera. If you aren’t familiar with what they are then I suggest doing a quick web search for a description / video. In short, a rangefinder is a camera that has a viewfinder (separate from the main camera lens) into which is built a way to correctly focus the main lens. It does this by showing a split image in the centre of the viewfinder. When you turn the focusing ring on the main lens to the correct (in focus) position the split image in the viewfinder merges into one.
Rangefinder focusing is fast and accurate and was the leading way to focus a camera lens before introduction of SLR cameras (where you look through the main camera lens instead of a separate viewfinder).
The original Canonet was first released in 1961 and was a slightly large and dare we say clunky camera with a fairly heavy winding / shutter action but it showed lot of promise that was refined in later versions. Over the next few generations Canon gradually made the Canonet more compact and increased the capabilities with more modern camera technology as it emerged which resulted in the models that we describe here.
This review focuses on the final generation of Canonet which actually consists of two minor variations with the cameras being virtually identical. They are known as the:
- New Canonet (released in 1969)
- Canonet G-III (released in 1972)
The only difference between these two cameras is that the G-III has a battery check lamp whereas the New Canonet moves the viewfinder needle (when pressing the battery test button) to indicate the battery level. The G-III has a ‘G-III’ badge on the front to identify it.
Let’s now delve into the excellent specifications of these cameras.
Canonet specifications
Lens
These Canonets all have a 40mm lens. This gives a slightly wider view than the human eye and is a great focal length for travel, street photography etc. The lens is fixed so you can’t zoom or switch to a telephoto lens. This was the case with the vast majority of rangefinders (with the exception of very top-end models like Leica and the Minolta CL/CLE).
Three variants with a different maximum lens aperture were produced:
| Model | Aperture |
| New Canonet QL17 / QL17 G-III | f/1.7 |
| New Canonet QL19 / QL19 G-III | f/1.9 |
| New Canonet 28 | f/2.8 |
The f/1.7 models are slightly more sought after – with a wider aperture they can operate slightly better in low light than the 1.9, and also give more blurred backgrounds due to the smaller depth of field. In practice however an aperture of 1.9 vs 1.7 isn’t a huge difference, so both are great cameras.
The New Canonet 28 is a little different. It was produced as the budget version of the range. While is still has a 40mm lens, the lens has a maximum aperture of f/2.8 which is a fair bit smaller than the 17 and 19. It also uses a lot more plastic in construction (while the 17 / 19 are virtually all metal), and has a smaller range of shutter speeds.
We will focus on the 17 / 19 models here.
Exposure modes and exposure control
The Canonet has an excellent exposure system with electronic metering. You can select between full manual exposure mode or shutter priority automatic. All controls are on the lens barrel including:
- Shutter speed
- Aperture
- Focusing
- Flash setting
In manual exposure mode the photographer selects both the shutter speed and lens aperture giving full control over the results.
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Manual mode - both aperture and shutter speed selected. |
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In automatic mode the photographer selects the shutter speed and then the camera automatically adjusts the aperture for each shot to make sure that exposure is correct.
| Automatic mode - turn the aperture ring to 'A'. | 
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These manual / automatic exposure modes are the same as the legendary Canon AE-1 SLR camera.
The Canonet has some markings on the lens to make automatic exposure use even easier. A lot of people see these markings but don't actually know what they're for but they are a neat aid for less experienced photographers.
Here’s how to use Automatic mode:
1. Turn the lens aperture ring to ‘A’.
2. Set the shutter speed.
In general, using ISO 100 film we would suggest a shutter speed of 1/125 as a good starting point (or 1/250 for ISO 200, 1/500 for ISO 400).
The Canonet simplifies this choice with three icons on the lens barrel
The icons are:
- A window > for shooting indoors (i.e. very poor light)
- A cloud > for gloomy conditions
- A sun > for bright conditions.
Simply move the black lens ring until the icon representing the lighting conditions from the three above is aligned with or closest to the lever that sets the film speed. In the example below the setting is for bright conditions.
The idea is that when you set out on your photography trip for the day you can simply move this ring to the right icon and the Canonet will have a suitable shutter speed which will cover the majority of lighting conditions in automatic mode for the day.
As you build your experience you will likely select the shutter speed yourself rather than rely on this suggestion but it's a great way to simply things.
Note that if the lighting is too poor for a photo then in automatic mode the Canonet will not let you take a photo.
AE lock
AE lock is the function in some cameras where you can point the camera at a scene and lock in the exposure values for that scene brightness. You can then change where you are pointing the camera and take a photo that were locked in. It is useful if for example taking a portrait of someone against a bright background. You first move in close and lock the exposure reading on your subject’s face, before moving back and taking the shot.
With the Canonet although the official specs don’t list AE lock as a feature pressing the shutter button down half-way will lock the exposure reading – effectively an AE lock function.
Film loading
This is an area where the Canonet truly excels. On the front of the camera (and several other Canon cameras of the same era) you will see a ‘QL’ badge. This stands for ‘Quick Loading’ and means that the camera is equipped with Canon’s proprietary quick film loading mechanism.
To load film, open the back of the camera and simply insert the film cannister into the left side and pull the tip of the film to the right, level with the orange mark and then close the back.
The camera takes care of grabbing the end of the film.
You then wind the film lever until it stops. The camera automatically knows that you have just loaded a film and advances the film onto the first frame of the film and then cocks the shutter.
To confirm that the film has loaded properly there is a little window on the back of the camera with some orange / black lines. As you wind the film these lines will move from side to side to confirm that the film has loaded properly.
The other little window on the rear of the camera turns orange to tell you if the shutter has been cocked.
Viewfinder information and focusing
Focusing is achieved using a lever at the base of the lens. This lever is easy to find while looking through the viewfinder and it has a relatively short travel to speed focusing.
The rangefinder focusing system relies on a system of little mirrors inside the viewfinder that are synchronized with the lens focusing mechanism. Sometimes these can get slightly out of sync, and the Canonet has a couple of hidden adjusters. Using a small screwdriver you can bring the rangefinder back to accuracy. The vertical adjuster is hidden behind a small metal plug on the back of the camera (it unscrews for access). The horizontal adjuster is accessed by removing the camera hot-shoe (flash socket) on the top of the camera.
The viewfinder display is fairly typical of a lot of rangefinder cameras of the era. There are lines to tell you where the edges of your photo are. Cleverly these actually move as you focus the lens (to compensate for the viewfinder being offset from the lens that actually takes the photo).
In the centre of the viewfinder is the rangefinder rectangle, while to the right is an exposure meter needle that indicates the correct aperture given the lighting conditions.
The exposure meter is turned on by turning the lens aperture ring to the ‘A’ position. This is useful since you can use the camera in Automatic mode to tell you what the recommended exposure settings are, but can then switch to manual mode to override the exposure if you wish.
Battery
Common with many cameras of the era, the Canonets were originally designed to take a 625-size 1.35-volt Mercury battery. Since these are no longer available, you will need a modern LR44 or SR44 battery and a little adaptor (since the modern batteries are smaller than the original Mercury batteries).
Modern batteries also have a slightly higher voltage (1.5 volts) than the 625 Mercury batteries.This higher voltage means that the camera’s meter will think that each scene is slightly brighter than it really is.
In reality this difference is slight, and you are highly unlikely to notice it in regular photo taking for a couple of reasons:
- Modern film is very tolerant of over / under exposure, and compensates for small exposure inaccuracies
- Camera exposure meters of the era are never 100% accurate, and these inaccuracies exceed any errors from battery voltage.
From our experience, using a 1.5v battery instead of a 1.35v battery results in underexposure by around ½ stop in dull conditions, and less than ½ stop in bright conditions.
If you are using slide film (which is less tolerant of incorrect exposure) and you want the metering to be exactly as per the original camera specs then you have a few options:
- Set the camera ISO to be lower than the film ISO (e.g. set the camera to ISO 70 when using ISO 100 film).
- Use a 675 hearing aid (‘Zinc Air’ battery). These have a voltage closer to that of a Mercury battery, although they need replacing more regularly.
- Buy a special voltage-reducing battery adaptor that automatically modifies the voltage to that of a Mercury battery (not cheap at around $70 each).happen to be using are using slide film
The Canonets we review here generally have a battery check button on the back of the camera.
In the G-III version the button illuminates a little light next to the button. With non-G-III models the check button moves the viewfinder meter needle to indicate if the battery is OK. Some of the non-G-III models don’t have a battery check button.
Flash features
Yet again the Canonet has some clever hidden features here.
To help understand these, it helps to know that in the early 70s camera flashguns generally gave out a fixed amount of light for each flash (known as a ‘manual’ flash setting). It was only later that the camera flash became more advanced (automatically measuring and varying the right amount of light for each photo).
To get the correct exposure / lighting with a manual flash depends on three factors:
- How powerful your flash is
- How far away your subject is
- The lens aperture setting
The Canonet has special features to take care of this for you.
Firstly to tell the camera how powerful your flash is there are some green numbers on the lens aperture ring (just to the right of the ‘A’ mark). Each flash has a number called a ‘Guide Number’ which indicates how powerful it is. You will generally need to look at the instruction manual for the flash to find this out. Set the camera to the number closest to the guide number of your flash.
| The aperture ring set to flash Guide Number 20 | 
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The second and third factors are handled automatically by the Canonet. When you set the aperture ring to one of the green values above, it automatically changes to flash mode whereby the camera automatically changes the lens aperture based on the focus setting of the lens. The idea is that if you are taking a flash photo of something relatively far away (e.g 5 metres), the lens needs a wide aperture to capture as much of the light from the flash as possible. Conversely, if taking a flash photo of something very close then a small aperture is needed since a large amount of the flash light will be reflected.
So, in the flash mode if you look at the viewfinder aperture needle you will see it change as you move the focusing ring. This is the camera automatically setting the right aperture based on the flash power and the subject distance. Pretty clever for the 1970s.
This is the procedure for using a manual flash with the Canonet.
If using a more modern automatic flash (where the flash automatically cuts off the flash light at the right point) then use the following procedure:
- Set the camera shutter speed to e.g. 1/125s. This isn’t actually critical, since the Canonet can handle shutter speeds up to 1/500s and it doesn’t affect the flash exposure.
- Set the lens aperture to the value indicated by the flash (normally a little table or window on the back of the flash will tell you.)
- Take the photo – the flash will automatically turn off when enough light has reached the camera.
Canon also released a special flash to accompany the Canonet, called the ‘Canolite D’. This is clever in that when attached to the camera, it tells the camera of its presence. All you need to do is leave the camera in automatic (‘A’) mode and shoot away. The camera automatically switches to manual flash mode and the camera / flash combination takes care of exposure.
Conclusion
For such a small camera, the Canonet packs in a lot of features. With its compact size, high quality lens, coupled with automatic and manual exposure control it has everything you could need for a travel / street photography companion. It is our go-to film camera for family trips and never fails to delight.
We generally have Canonets in stock. Click HERE for our selection.