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Olympus PEN-F

The current Olympus M43 cameras are all good, and some of the lenses are superb. The only downsides from my POV are:-

1) The Olympus menus are a world of pain, and take some time getting used to, but you can configure what you need the most onto function buttons.
2) Being an M43 sensor, they are not 'that' large so images can get a bit noisy at high ISO.

On the upside they are capable of taking great pictures, see Gromit's work on this forum.

I had a client on one of my recent workshops with one, and he used it very effectively.
 
Rob - David's summed up the 'Olympus Experience' pretty well (and thanks for his kind comments re my stuff).

The menus are something of an acquired taste (that's being slightly kind) but once the camera's configured to one's own needs, I've found it really quick and easy to use.

The Pen F? It's a lovely thing, but you've got to want that style of camera - the OM-D EM5 II will do all the Pen can, and with the added bonus of weather sealing. The Pen is beautifully made though, with every click and turn of button/wheel feeling nicely weighted. The shutter release is also remarkably similar in feel to my old OM-2n - I'm convinced that isn't by coincidence. :)

In similar fashion to the X100* Fuji, it's a camera that makes me want to take photos - but with the added benefit of being able to use some rather lovely M43 glass. I've become very fond of using the Pen with the tiny Panasonic 20-1.7. Small, neat, very sharp and cheap too.
 
Thanks for the feedback guys. I had the Olympus OMD EM5 Mk2 before I bought the Fuji XPro2 and found it a rather uninspiring camera to use to be honest.

I will go and have a look at the PEN F in the flesh and see what I think. The option with the 17mm lens looks very appealing. Also, the B&W presets do look superb it has to be said.
 
I'm considering a return back to M43. I really enjoyed my EM5 but moved on to the Fuji system which again i've had a lot of fun with. After handling an EM10 at Duty Free the other day it got me thinking about a return. The Pen-F looks lovely but there seems to be a real premium to pay for the styling over one of the lower bodies.

Having been out of the Olympus game for a few years, apart from the slight increase in resolution is there anything else i'm missing here between the Pen and something like the EM10 ?

James
 
I went to a lecture recently and the photographer had taken most of the images on the PEN-F and the results looked, on screen at least, superb. He commented on how nice the camera was to use, and particularly the ability to watch the image 'develop' on the LCD during long exposures, which appeals to me a lot. He did comment that he felt the sensor was 'too small' for high quality exhibition sized prints, and he used something else for that (can't recall what). My brother had a film PEN half frame camera many, many years ago, and I remember it fondly, though he never let me use it!
 
JemHayward said:
I went to a lecture recently and the photographer had taken most of the images on the PEN-F and the results looked, on screen at least, superb. He commented on how nice the camera was to use, and particularly the ability to watch the image 'develop' on the LCD during long exposures, which appeals to me a lot. He did comment that he felt the sensor was 'too small' for high quality exhibition sized prints, and he used something else for that (can't recall what). My brother had a film PEN half frame camera many, many years ago, and I remember it fondly, though he never let me use it!
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The small sensor is the only thing that pits me off. I've had Olympus and Lumix M43 cameras in the past and noise and dynamic range were always a disappointment.

Maybe the newer sensors have improved?
 
At the moment it is a good time to move into m43rds format - the OMD EM1 mki has been superseded by the MKii and so there are a lot of the first version available at a good price ie less than £400. Any lenses you buy will be useable across all m43rds cameras and there appears to be a good market in used lenses if you know where to look.

The Mki is no mean camera.
 
JemHayward said:
I went to a lecture recently and the photographer had taken most of the images on the PEN-F and the results looked, on screen at least, superb. He commented on how nice the camera was to use, and particularly the ability to watch the image 'develop' on the LCD during long exposures, which appeals to me a lot. He did comment that he felt the sensor was 'too small' for high quality exhibition sized prints, and he used something else for that (can't recall what). My brother had a film PEN half frame camera many, many years ago, and I remember it fondly, though he never let me use it!
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Jem a couple of things:-

I had a OMD EM1Mkii on loan for a couple of weeks, the long exposure g'develop' has to be set up the user and you can define a number of time intervals during the exposure whereby the image is shown on the LCD, but there are only a small number of 'image display' steps that can be shown, and I'm not sure if the histogram is displayed alongside.

The OMD EM1Mkii had a fancy subpixel shift on the sensor (using the in camera IS) such that when the camera was fixed (ie on a tripod) it could create a mearesolution image, its called the 50M mode, but is generates a 10Kx8K resultant image (RAW files as well). The level of detail is staggering, but the camera must be dead still, half a pixel movement and you get a non-sharp image, and the pixels are very small, so approx 2 micron movement and your image is knackered. When it works, it works really well and the images are astonishing. (It also restricts you on the aperture that can be set in this mode, but I had no problem at F8) - Not sure if this feature is on other Olympus Cameras.
 
It's a lovely camera. I find the 4/3rds images very good, esp the colour and tone rendition, BUT, my other camera is full frame, and there is no comparison in IQ. For a beautiful, usaable camera with GREAT lenses, producing very good images that won't be used beyond A3 size, it's one of the best although hugely expensive, considering what the OM 10 does for less than half the price. Good looks cost a lot of money!
 
Rockmeister said:
For a beautiful, usaable camera with GREAT lenses, producing very good images that won't be used beyond A3 size, it's one of the best although hugely expensive, considering what the OM 10 does for less than half the price. Good looks cost a lot of money!
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John sums the Pen up pretty well here I feel. You've got to want this sort of camera to spend out on one though. Saying that, I picked up a spotless sub-1k shot, boxed, silver Pen for 700 quid from MPB - a new one was way beyond budget.

I'm not going to pretend that it'll compare with FF for IQ, but compared to the Fuji cameras it's actually quite close and unlike Fuji there's no sneaky RAW noise reduction being performed under the hood. The Oly's raw files are really easy to work with (so much more so than Fuji X-Trans) and because of the superb IBIS it's no problem keeping ISO low - I've had plenty of hand-held shots with the Pen F taken at 1/4 sec or even slower which are crystal clear.

I had a few 'wtf am I doing with M43' moments before really entering into the system, but now I'm settled it's just really good kit to use.

Does look rather sweet too...and that 75-1.8 is peachy. :cool:

Pick up a Pen by Boxertrixter, on Flickr
 
If I win a significant amount of money on the lottery, then the Pen-F will be on my list.

Meanwhile my old Fuji X-something short zoom compact (can't bothered to look up number) and brilliant, go-everywhere, Sony RX100 and iPhone 7 will do fine.
 
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