Some thoughts on the OM-D E-M5 plus Olympus 12mm f2

papasnap

papasnap

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Hello all!

I wanted to share some initial thoughts on the Olympus OM-D E-M5, along with the Olympus 12mm f2 prime.

Firstly, I should just mention that this is the first "serious" digital camera I've bought since a Nikon D70S back in 2005. For the last 6 years, I've been shooting slide film exclusively, on either a Hexar AF, Zeiss Ikon, Leica M6 TTL 0.58x or M7 0.58x. During a 4 month overseas trip late last year I had the unpleasant experience of a lab in Istanbul ruining 14 rolls of E-6 film (ouch!), which got me thinking about digital again, at least as a supplement to my M7..

THINGS I LIKE
  1. It's clearly been made by people who really care about photography. Much like my leica M7, it looks, feels and operates like a serious tool, not a throwaway appliance. It's hefty enough to feel solid, but light enough that (unlike my M7) I'm happy to carry it everywhere. I used to carry an M6/M7 + 35mm f1.2 nokton in a Domke F-803 every day, but had to stop after some spine surgery a year ago, so this is a major win.
  2. Startup time (from off to ready for first shot) is very quick - I haven't lost any shots yet waiting for it to turn on, unlike some other digital cameras I've tried. Pro DSLRs are probably quicker still, but it'd be splitting hairs.
  3. It's very fast in operation - shot to shot time (at least on the Sandisk 32gb 95mb/sec SD card I'm using) is as quick as I need, and AF speed is very very fast. I first tried Face Priority AF, which works well in most cases but I like the predicatability of setting single point AF in the center with focus & recompose, which has been working great for me. I'm impressed by how well the AF works in dim light, even without the AF assist light (I switched that off as it distracts subjects). A friend with an old Panasonic GF1 had warned me that in low light AF just won't cut it and I'll have to switch to MF, but on the OM-D the AF performance has so far been good enough I haven't had to use MF - I find I'll usually run out of shutter speed (ie have to use such a slow shutter that the subject moves too much) before I run out of AF. In fact at a party I tried a friends Canon 7D + 50mm f1.8 and it's AF would struggle terribly in light that doesn't seem to phase (forgive the pun) my little OM-D.
  4. The in body image stabilisation is wonderful! Makes a huge difference, in both still and video capture. I wouldn't buy a digital camera without it these days, which is one of the main reasons I walked away from Nikon and Canon's DSLRs.
  5. Image quality is really excellent - I'm pleasantly suprised. Straight out of camera JPEGs are probably the nicest I've seen from any camera, which is convenient. After shooting exclusively slide film for the last 5-6 years I'm having to learn digital workflows again. Personally I love taking photos and looking at photos, and everything that happens in between I'm slightly allergic to. Currently I'm trying out shooting RAW then feeding it to Lightroom 4.1, make some basic adjustments, then into Alien Skin Exposure to "de-digital" the images and try and make them resemble what I like in film. Seems to be working well and takes far less time than scanning slides.. let me know what you think of the images below, which have gone through that workflow. It's a fine line between "pleasantly analogue looking" and "looks like instagram" alas :(
  6. It's small and unobtrusive. I picked up a friend's 5D MKIII with 24-70mm + giant lens hood and laughed when I held my little OM-D with 12mm f2 lens next to it - it seemed about 20% of the size. This is another reason I've kept away from buying a full frame DSLR - I remember how people used to act nervous back in 2005 when I pointed my Nikon D70S + 30mm f1.4 at them, then when I switched to a little unintimidating Konica Hexar AF I got much more natural shots.
  7. The video quality is excellent, at least for my needs. The stabilisation makes an enourmous difference - I took my OM-D with me on a helicopter flight over sydney last week, and was amazed by how steady (and good looking) the footage was.
  8. The Olympus 12mm F2 is a little gem of a lens, and can hold it's head up even compared to my m-mount leica, zeiss and voigtlander lenses. I love the fact that you can slip a clutch on the focus ring and it becomes a proper mechanical focus lens with a DOF scale - although to be honest the AF has been so good I've only used MF in a small handful of shots.
  9. The camera is very customisable - which makes a big difference. It takes some getting used to but I've now got my camera set up well. There's an excellent article on DPReview with tips on how to do this - see http://www.dpreview.com/articles/9115179666/user-guide-getting-the-most-out-of-the-olympus-e-m5
  10. The Electronic ViewFinder (EVF) is far better than I initially realised, and is actually excellent. The first time I raised it to my eye, I saw the jagged (not anti-aliased) font used for the info display which made me think the resolution of the EVF image was lower than it really is. I switched the info setting for the EVF to image only and that made me realise it's actually pretty great (and a half-press of the shutter will make critical info like aperture and shutter appear too).
  11. The OLED screen on the back is dynamite! So clear and sharp, and excellent visability even in bright light. The single-touch to focus & take an image has been suprisingly handy when holding out the camera at funny angles for a shot. The fact that you can angle the screen for high/low shots is a big plus too.

THINGS I DON'T LIKE
  1. When set to single focus, center point the AF is really great about 95% of the time - but every now and again I find it has inexplicably missed the target and focused on something behind it. It's not a big concern, but for important shots it pays to review the shot in magnified view to make sure you really did nail the focus.
  2. With such a customisable camera, why on earth can some functions be assigned to some buttons and not others? There's a whole stack of great functions I can assign to Fn2 but not Fn1. Olympus can you please allow the same set of functions to be assigned to any button?
  3. The 12mm f2 is a terrific lens - but can I please get it in black to match my black OM-D? It's not a deal breaker but a silver lens on a black body is more distracting than I'd like.
  4. While you're at it Olympus - please weatherproof the 12mm f2 too. I have a weatherproof OM-D but the lenses I want to use on it aren't weatherproof, which (for now) means it's a feature I can't use.
  5. Also, can we please get a fast 35mm equivalent (ie 17.5mm) lens with AF and weather proofing? Something like the Pana-Leica 25mm, but at 17.5mm. My next lens will probably be the Voigtlander 17.5mm f0.95, but the lack of AF limits it's flexibility.




















Well - that's all I can think of for now. Will have a think on what else to mention. If you've got any questions, please let me know!

Thanks!
 
nice photos, like the processing as well. with regard to the things you don't like no. 1, have you tried setting it to use a smaller AF box? i find the smaller AF box definitely helps with misfocus issues. also, some folks seem to have a lot of success with the function that focuses on the eye you select, that reduces the misfocuses as well. i'm still futzing around with that function seeing how it works.
 
Great post! And good to see another person who gets that post-processing isn't for everybody...I wonder how you would do if you shot JPEG more often...that might streamline your post workflow even more.

What do you tend to do in Alien Skin...I also rather liked your processing on those images.

Thanks again, very insightful.
 
thanks all!

dfatty, that's an excellent idea - I hadn't realised I could do that! I'll have to keep reading through the manual..

dreilly, a while back before the launch of the E-M5 I downloaded a trial of Alien Skin Exposure and fed it some press shots taken with the E-M5, just to see what was possible. Exposure has dozens of film simulations, some of them are pretty great, some of them are unimpressive and some just a bit gimmicky. I used one of their presets (based on version of Kodachrome) as a starting point and tweaked pretty much every setting on it to something I liked - at least to get the ball rolling, I'm sure I'll continue to tweak it as I try more things. It was more expensive than I liked (US$249) but I'm impressed at the results.

cheers!
 
great pics there....having just picked mine up, im enjoying it muchly....picked up the sigma 19/2.8 as well with the kit lenses......12/2, 25/1.4 will be next.
quality is superb.
 
I promised myself not to buy any camera before Photokina time, but with this kind of reviews it is getting difficult :)
robert
PS: I always regretted not to having bought the OM1 when it was launched maybe now is the correct time to get "my" Olympus.
 
Is that a hipsterette I see in Photo #3? That'd better be a PBR she's drinking. Otherwise she'll have to turn in her Coolness Card....
 
Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the E-M5, it was great to read from the perspective of someone in a similar situation as mine: predominantly a film shooter with a slight distaste for computer-based post-processing but also looking to acquire a complete digital setup for work.

I did play with the E-M5 and posted some of my thoughts over in another thread but this is making me rethink it. Perhaps I was too hasty with my judgement of it? After all, I only spent about 20 mins with it. I've been testing out a D800 as well as 5D Mark III and as much as I prefer having the weight and heft of a sizable camera, portability is often something you overlook when you have a brand new camera in your hands at a store.

Hmm. Decisions.
 
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