Olympus PEN E-PL1 (Body Only, Black)

Pros: See in summary

Cons: See in summary

Summary: I bought this camera specifically as an alternative to travelling with a DSLR. To round out the kit, I bought the 40-150mm as a second lens and I can't believe just how light that second lens is. Between both lenses, you can really cover most of your shooting needs.

We just spent a couple of days in the Lake District and I carried the camera and second lens throughout my stay and it was no trouble at all, i hardly noticed I had it with me. This is in contrast to my previous outings with my heavier DSLR kit, when by the end of the day, you can start to feel that lugging the camera has made it more central to the trip thatn should be the case. When I came home and checked the shots, I didn't really see anything that I would have done any better had I been using my DSLR.

I find access to the menu to be fine and I can easily change settings on the hoof. There is a sub menu (represented by a COG WHEEL) that is hidden in the default menu, but you can activate it and this brigs up fast access to the more critical settings - This is an important tool, I think perhaps they hid it so that new camera users would not accidentally change settings, but on balance I think the menu is so important that they should have had it clearly on show.

Auto-focus response time is fine, out of camera mage quality is superb, I have the sharpness set to +1 and contrast at zero. I am still doing a bit of post processing, usually just going into levels to drop the mid tones a tad. Colours are nice and warm, White balance looks very accurate and the kit lens gives a good result.

The in body stabilisation is good and helps keep the non stabilised lenses light. In the tests that I have done, it is at the slowest shutter speeds that the stabilisation is most noticable and can save the shot. At higher shutter speeds, I have not found it much of an advantage and since the camera does not have a viewfinder, so you have to hold the camera out in front of you at arms length, the user does have to concentrate on not creating blur through movement. I will probably but the electronic viewfinder in time (VF-2), though I do think that this is a dear accessory.

Bottom line is that this is a good all round take anywhere camera that produces good images, an ideal travel cam for those who appreciate good image quality and the advantages of changing lenses.

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Updated on Sep 20, 2011

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Updated on Oct 2, 2011

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