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

Canon Demi

Canon · Fixed lens · 18×24 mm on 35mm film · 1963

Also known as: Canon Demi 28 · Canon Demi C · Canon Demi EE28 · キヤノン デミ · キャノン デミ

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
Demi (1963) Half-frame 1963 — No figure published
Demi 2 Half-frame 1964 — No figure published
Demi C (April 1965) Half-frame 1965 — No figure published
Demi EE28 (April 1967) Half-frame 1967 — No figure published
  1. Two Demi pages, split on the lens. The Demi, Demi 2, Demi C and Demi EE28 carry Canon's 28mm f/2.8; the Demi S, Demi Rapid and Demi EE17 carry a 30mm f/1.7 that is a different optical design and sits on the other page. Canon's museum treats all six as one series, which is true of the badge and not of the glass.
  2. Canon's museum gives the Demi C two lenses that 'only fit the Demi C', which makes it, strictly, an interchangeable-lens camera. It is here as a variant because the lenses were never offered to anything else and the body is a Demi in every other respect.
  3. The colours are real and brief: black, red, white and blue by the end of 1963, then black. No quantities were ever given.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Rounded metal body panels wrapped over the corners — styling that Casual Photophile and camera-wiki both call ahead of its decade
  • One outer ring that sets a shutter-and-aperture pair; the match needle in the finder tells you which
  • The only Demi line in red, white and blue, briefly

Demi (1963):

  • Canon SH 28mm f/2.8, five elements in three groups
  • Seiko-sha L shutter working a behind-the-lens light-value programme from EV 8 (f/2.8 at 1/30) to EV 17 (f/22 at 1/250), plus B; the outer ring moves both together
  • Selenium match-needle meter; ASA 10–400; zone focus with pictographs at 1, 3 and 15 m, range 0.8–15 m
  • 115 × 68 × 37 mm, 380 g
  • Black leatherette, and for the rest of 1963 red, white and blue — the three colours were withdrawn quickly

Demi 2:

  • Front and back covers in aluminium instead of brass (Canon Camera Museum)

Demi C (April 1965):

  • The interchangeable-lens Demi: a 28mm f/2.8 and a 50mm f/2.8 that fit nothing but the Demi C

Demi EE28 (April 1967):

  • SH 28mm f/2.8, five in three, back on a selenium full-programme body: EV 8 (f/2.8, 1/30) to EV 17.5 (f/25, 1/300), B
  • 0.42× finder with projected frames, 90% coverage; 116 × 69 × 39 mm, 290 g; 11,300 yen

Specifications

Format
18×24 mm on 35mm film · 72 exposures
Finder
Kepler finder, 0.41×, 90% coverage, with the meter's needles (Demi); reversed Galilean with projected frames on the EE28 · 90% coverage · no rangefinder image
Shutter
Seiko-sha L leaf, programmed light-value pairs · f/2.8 at 1/30 to f/22 at 1/250 as coupled pairs, plus B (Demi); f/2.8 at 1/30 to f/25 at 1/300 on the EE28 · flash sync X
Film advance
Thumbwheel
Meter
Selenium cell with a moving needle; on the Demi the photographer turns the ring until the second needle matches; on the EE28 the programme is fully automatic
Weight
380 g
Dimensions
115 × 68 × 37 mm
Country
Japan

What reviewers say

History

Canon came to the half frame four years after Olympus and made a point of arriving in style. The Demi of February 1963 wraps rounded metal panels over its corners in a way that still looks newer than the Canonets sold beside it, and it came, for a few months, in red, white and blue as well as black. Inside is a five-element 28mm f/2.8, a Seiko-sha shutter that couples aperture and speed into light-value pairs from f/2.8 at 1/30 to f/22 at 1/250, and a selenium meter whose needle you match by turning the one outer ring. Focus is by zone, three pictographs, 0.8 to 15 metres. It cost 10,800 yen.

Six Demis followed in four years, and this page carries the ones with the 28mm f/2.8: the Demi 2 with aluminium covers, the Demi C of 1965 with two interchangeable lenses that fit nothing else, and the Demi EE28 of 1967, a fully programmed selenium camera at 290 grams that was the last of the line. The Demi S, Demi Rapid and Demi EE17 carry a different lens, a 30mm f/1.7, and have their own page.

Reviewers like it more than the Pen EE, for the reason Craig Sinclair gives: it lets you decide. His Demi was the one of three half-frames that became a keeper; Analog.Cafe calls it lovely and warns about the selenium cell; a 2026 review found the needle still accurate after sixty years. The complaint, when there is one, is the coupled pairs — no choosing aperture and speed separately — and a zone focus with nothing to confirm it.

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 Demi
Canon Demi, first model, with the SH 28mm f/2.8 — Austin Calhoon, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Sample photo taken with the Canon Demi
Bell & Howell / Canon Demi, the American badge — E Magnuson, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

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

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $89 across 31 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-06 (middle half $65–$150). First day tracked.

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 2026-09-06. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Canon Demi EE17 · Canon Dial 35 · Fujica Half · Konica Eye · Olympus Pen

Sources (6)

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.