Glass Bodies a variant-level encyclopedia of vintage lenses and cameras by iwillpat

Canon AF35M

Canon · Fixed lens · 24×36mm on 35mm film · 1979

Also known as: Canon AF35M · Canon Sure Shot · Canon Autoboy · キヤノン オートボーイ · Canon AF35M II · Canon New Sure Shot

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
AF35M / Sure Shot / Autoboy 35mm compact 1979–1983 — No lifetime total published. Canon's museum gives none; the one figure in circulation is a RATE — about 110,000 a month by late 1981 — and it is carried here as a rate, never a total¹
AF35M II / New Sure Shot / Autoboy 2 35mm compact 1983 — —
Quartz Date versions 35mm compact 1979 — —
  1. The 110,000-a-month figure is a production rate reported for late 1981, roughly two years into the run. It is not a total and must not be multiplied into one: the rate at launch and at the end of the run are unknown, and Canon has published no cumulative figure. Presented as the rate it is.
  2. Canon's museum gives the release as November 1979 at ¥42,800 body and ¥2,000 case, and the lens as 38mm f/2.8 in four elements in three groups — a Tessar arrangement. It publishes no shutter range and no production total.
  3. The name. Canon's own museum notes that 'Autoboy' became a generic term for autofocus compacts in Japan, the way 'Instamatic' had for cartridge cameras — a fame that outlived the camera and attaches to none of its Western names.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • The autofocus is ACTIVE — a near-infrared beam and triangulation — which is what Canon's 'first' claim actually rests on; the passive Konica C35 AF had shipped two years earlier
  • Program exposure only: nothing for the photographer to set beyond the film speed

AF35M / Sure Shot / Autoboy:

  • One camera, three names: Autoboy on the Japanese market, Sure Shot in the Americas, AF35M in Europe, Asia and Oceania — Canon's museum treats them as one product
  • Canon Lens 38mm 1:2.8 on the front ring; near-infrared autofocus window beside the finder
  • Motorised film advance, which was the other novelty beside the autofocus

AF35M II / New Sure Shot / Autoboy 2:

  • The 1983 replacement, which fully superseded the original; the same three-market naming pattern

Quartz Date versions:

  • Databack fitted; otherwise the camera above

Specifications

Format
24×36mm on 35mm film
Shutter
programmed electronic leaf shutter · programmed; Canon's museum entry publishes the lens and the focusing system but not the shutter range, and no source read here fills it
Meter
CdS metering driving a programmed exposure — Canon publishes the programme's existence, not its range; the AF35ML entry two years later is the first in the line with a stated EV span.
Country
Japan

Where sources disagree

The 'world's first' claim
  • Canon, verbatim: 'This was the world's first Lens-Shutter 35mm autofocus camera at the time' (Canon Camera Museum)
  • The Konica C35 AF of 1977 — a lens-shutter 35mm camera with autofocus, two years earlier, using a passive Honeywell Visitronic system (camera-wiki; Konica's own history)

Better supported: Both are true of different things

Canon's sentence is accurate only with a qualifier it does not print: the AF35M is the first with an ACTIVE, infrared autofocus, and the first to sell in numbers that made the category. The C35 AF was first to autofocus at all. Every retelling of 'the first autofocus compact' inherits the museum's elision, so the entry states both rather than either.

What reviewers say

History

Canon’s museum page for this camera says it was “the world’s first Lens-Shutter 35mm autofocus camera at the time,” and that sentence has been repeated in every account since. It is true with a word missing. The Konica C35 AF of 1977 was a lens-shutter 35mm camera that focused itself, two years earlier, using a passive Honeywell system that compared two images. What Canon built in November 1979 was the first with an active autofocus — a near-infrared beam thrown at the subject and triangulated back — and, more to the point, the first that sold in the numbers that turned a novelty into a category. Both cameras were first at something. Canon’s was first at the thing that mattered commercially.

The body carried three names for three markets, and Canon’s museum is explicit that they are one product: Autoboy in Japan, Sure Shot in the Americas, AF35M everywhere else. The Japanese name is the one that stuck. Canon itself records that “Autoboy” became the generic word for an autofocus compact in Japan, the way Instamatic had for cartridge cameras — a fame that outlived the camera and attaches to none of its Western names. The lens was a 38mm f/2.8 in four elements in three groups, a Tessar arrangement, and the film advanced by motor, which in 1979 was the other half of the novelty.

What is not on the record is the number. Canon publishes the release month and the price — ¥42,800, plus ¥2,000 for the case — but no production total, and the one figure that circulates is a rate: about 110,000 cameras a month by late 1981. That is a rate two years into a four-year run, and it says nothing about the months before or after. Multiplying it out produces a number that looks like a total and is not one. The entry carries it as what it is.

The AF35M II replaced it in 1983, under the same three-market naming. By then the argument the original had made was over: every maker had a compact that focused itself, and the question had moved on to how good the lens could be. That question is answered elsewhere on this page — by the Contax T of 1984, and by Canon’s own AF35ML, which put an f/1.9 into the same kind of body eighteen months after this one.

Expand Collapse

This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Example photos

Sample photo taken with the Canon AF35M
Canon AF35M — Canon Inc, via Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)
Sample photo taken with the Canon AF35M
Canon AF35M, the Sure Shot in America — E Magnuson, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Sample photo wanted — shot with a Canon AF35M? We'd love to feature it (with credit).

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $100 across 94 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $69–$130). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 3 days: down 15% from $120.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$100$69–$13094
2026-09-09$100$69–$13094
2026-09-06$120$99–$13059

Asking prices from the listings scanned, not sales; junk-flagged rows and auction lots excluded; other currencies are not converted.

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Listings updated 2026-09-11. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Canon AF35ML · Olympus XA2 · Konica Hexar AF

Sources (4)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this camera, know a serial number I'm missing, or can see where I have it wrong, tell me — corrections, serials and sample photos are all worth having.