The Canon T90 first came out in 1986 as the top-of-the-line Canon T series, the camera in the collection was made in January of 1986. It was the last professional manual lens camera from Canon, but not the last camera in the T series. I was able to find this gem at a local vintage camera show, but when it comes to vintage or retro cameras this one looks far more modern than old. The ergonomics of the camera are one of its best features (to me), when I compare it to my Canon 5D mark ii the similarities are astounding even though there is a 22 year difference between the two.
After shooting a few rolls of film with the camera I found that it is quite easy to just pick it up and go as the buttons for the various features are easy to find. One of the features that I quite enjoyed and wish Canon would bring back (wink wink, nudge nudge Canon) to more of their cameras is the viewfinder shutter. This little shutter when selected blocks the eyepiece with a black metal curtain to prevent light from coming in that could go around the mirror and fog the film during long exposures or on bright days when using a cable release tripod mounted and you not blocking the viewfinder with your head. I also enjoyed that the camera uses four AA batteries that you can find anywhere in the world and not have to rely on specialized batteries.
All in all I enjoy using this camera and I’m sure to use it more, it’s built tough so it’s nice and heavy something I like as I find it makes hand holding more stable even though I’m usually tripod mounted for most of my photography. A few down sides that I’ve learned about through research is that the camera does not have a PC cord for flash photography but it was the first camera from Canon that offered TTL light metering. Another downside was the memory battery, it’s located internally and requires a skilled technician to replace should it fail, and as with everything older Canon no longer supports replacement parts for the camera since 1998. One last downside that I noticed is that the camera doesn’t offer mirror lock up, Canon thought that the mirror was sufficiently dampened by the light seal so it was never added, personally, mirror lock up is a must on any pro camera.
The Specs:
Produced: February 1986 to 1991
Type of camera: 35mm SLR
Film/picture format: 35mm film producing a picture format of 24x36mm.
Lens Mount: Canon FD
Lens(es): Interchangeable with various manual lenses using the FD mount.
Shutter: Vertical-travel, focal-plane electronic shutter. With multi-program AE and preset aperture AE with shutter speeds ranging from B, 30 seconds to 1/4000 sec. with flash sync at 1/250 shutter speeds could be set by either whole or half steps.
Exposure metering: Full-aperture TTL metering (center weighted averaging, partial metering at center, spot metering at center) with shutter speed, and aperture-priority AE, variable shift program AE (7 modes), manual, TTL preset aperture AE, and aperture-set. AE lock provided. Exposure compensation range of ±2 EV (in 1/3-stop increments). Film speed range from ISO 6 to 6400..
Viewfinder: Fixed eye-level pentaprism with 0.77x magnification and 94%
Focussing screen: 8 Interchangeable focusing screens
Reflex mirror: yes, Automatic return
Depth-of-field preview: yes, with lens stop down push lever
Frame counter: Yes, additive.
Film advance: Automatic with a maximum continuous rate of 4.5 a second.
Power source: Yes four AA batteries, and one BR-1225 or CR-1220 for memory backup
Camera Back: Interchangeable.
Body Finish: Black moulded plastic around solid metal body