Olympus OM-D E-M5, E-M1, E-M10 - Mk1, Mk2 & Mk3 Owners Thread

For now I have been dipping in & out of Dave Smith's stream

As the menu structure is different and indeed the OM-1 is different, I have found the bits I have watched informative and logically helpful.

I am certainly looking forward to the 10pm Brooke & Peter one for, hopefully, wildlife photography insights :)

@RedRobin I will have a watch of the earlier one later and see what I make of it ;) I have previously seen and linked to a Chris Eyre-Walker OM-1 video and thought in that he made a good case for the OM-1 in regard to what he, as pro tog, used it for to actually earn this living. Such positivity with context in regard to both "usage" and 'trust' in what he could use it for was one very convincing video presentation to prompt my pre-order................though I don't expect to earn (much/if any???) money from its usage :)
 
nog said:
Don’t suppose there were any figures given for “all the pre orders”. Mine is with wex but assume Olympus direct orders will be fulfilled first..
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.... My understanding is that the Olympus OMDS online shop orders (pre-orders) will ship at the same time and not ahead of UK retailers. @Box Brownie, was this your understanding too?
 
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Box Brownie said:
For now I have been dipping in & out of Dave Smith's stream

As the menu structure is different and indeed the OM-1 is different, I have found the bits I have watched informative and logically helpful.
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.... It was excellent! Obviously there is a lot of detail which reading the manual RTFM will answer.
Box Brownie said:
I am certainly looking forward to the 10pm Brooke & Peter one for, hopefully, wildlife photography insights :)
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.... Me too! The overall webpage from OMDS says 8pm but it says 10pm GMT on the YouTube video window and in about 6 hours time from now.
 
RedRobin said:
.... My understanding is that the Olympus OMDS online shop orders (pre-orders) will ship at the same time and not ahead of UK retailers. @Box Brownie, was this your understanding too?
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Yes, March 7th was the stated shipping date on the webshop for the UK/EU....................I can only surmise, the question of stock to hand, that "they" have a structed plan in place to try to ensure some degree of 'even' distribution across direct webshop pre-orders and all(?) the UK/EU retailers who have put their own orders in to meet their pre-orders.

But I suspect the stock is of course finite and fingers crossed the next shipment to German is already in the pipeline to meet further (missed out) orders :thinking:
 
Don't these prices make you glad about mFT and the superb quality optics made by Olympus/OM Systems
www.talkphotography.co.uk

How Much!! - new Canon Super Tele lenses

Can't quite believe the prices for the new Canon Super Tele lenses Canon RF 800mm f5.6 - £19099 Canon RF 1200mm f8 - £22449 The 800mm is considerably more expensive than the 600mm F4 with a 1.4x converter added so you would hope the picture quality justifies an extra £5k!
www.talkphotography.co.uk www.talkphotography.co.uk
 
Box Brownie said:
Ah! well strange that he has not posted more widely about his usage & thoughts???
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Andy has shared his thoughts with his Wildbunch group - blown away by his images and comments during a lengthy Zoom last week. He's also offering training with the OM-! after deliveries are underway.
 
Box Brownie said:
Don't these prices make you glad about mFT and the superb quality optics made by Olympus/OM Systems
www.talkphotography.co.uk

How Much!! - new Canon Super Tele lenses

Can't quite believe the prices for the new Canon Super Tele lenses Canon RF 800mm f5.6 - £19099 Canon RF 1200mm f8 - £22449 The 800mm is considerably more expensive than the 600mm F4 with a 1.4x converter added so you would hope the picture quality justifies an extra £5k!
www.talkphotography.co.uk www.talkphotography.co.uk
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Makes the 150-400 look excellent value when you think the 150-400 with the MC20 gives a touch more reach than the Canon 1200mm based on a 1 6 crop factor the 150-400 is excellent value and a lot less weight to hike around not sure if the 1200mm takes a TC but with a F8 aperture I would think not £22k buys heck of a lot of OM kit
 
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Box Brownie said:
Don't these prices make you glad about mFT and the superb quality optics made by Olympus/OM Systems
www.talkphotography.co.uk

How Much!! - new Canon Super Tele lenses

Can't quite believe the prices for the new Canon Super Tele lenses Canon RF 800mm f5.6 - £19099 Canon RF 1200mm f8 - £22449 The 800mm is considerably more expensive than the 600mm F4 with a 1.4x converter added so you would hope the picture quality justifies an extra £5k!
www.talkphotography.co.uk www.talkphotography.co.uk
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mazdaman said:
Makes the 150-400 look excellent value when you think the 150-400 with the MC20 gives a touch more reach than the Canon 1200mm based on a 1 6 crop factor the 150-400 is excellent value and a lot less weight to hike around not sure if the 1200mm takes a TC but with a F8 aperture I would think not £22k buys heck of a lot of OM kit
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.... Indeed! There is absolutely no doubt whatsoever about the very high quality of Canon's (and Nikon's and Sony's) supertelephoto lenses but the Oly/OM 150-400mm TC Pro is just as good, is lighterweight and so more enabling, and is more weatherproof backed up by international certification, all at a fraction of the price!

Everyone here is probably sick and tired of me waxing lyrical about the big white Oly zoom lens but I have used it weekly since July 2021 and still think it's excellent as do wildlife professionals. I know it's a lot of money at £6.5K but my whole retired life revolves around photography.

If anyone here is seriously considering it I have written an online review and have absolutely no vested interest.
 
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I note that Stewart (Lenses for Hire) has a 150-400 on his books.....

Perhaps for a specific need that is just maybe something I could justify hiring :thinking: but at £301 for 7 days it will have to be "needed".
 
I’ve just hired a 12-100 for a few days from @StewartR . I think I want to buy one but it seems more sensible to hire and try first…
 
Box Brownie said:
I note that Stewart (Lenses for Hire) has a 150-400 on his books.....

Perhaps for a specific need that is just maybe something I could justify hiring :thinking: but at £301 for 7 days it will have to be "needed".
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.... When I used to shoot Canon I hired their EF 500mm F/4L II from Stewart to try-before-you-buy and of course subsequently bought one. Selling it in 2019 funded my Olympus E-M1X plus a couple of lenses due to the huge price differential.

Box Brownie said:
That can be the biggest 'problem' with hiring...... :LOL:
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.... :LOL: I don't know what you mean, much!! :LOL:

I'm not the best person to ask about whether to buy an ED 150-400mm TC Pro or not! I am guaranteed to tell you to go for it (providing of course you can find the funds and would use it a fair bit). I didn't hire mine first, I just took the plunge knowing I could return it. I did many many hours of research about it first including long translated interviews with the Japanese designers and engineers. As a designer myself (graphics and retired) I totally understand their ethos, attitude and processes, and consequently have faith in them.

Some photographers have the attitude that all companies are out to solely screw money out of a customer and will do or say anything to succeed. If that customer is also shall we say a 'mean' person, then the whole experience is very negative. Win-Win is the way to happiness.
 
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Been following Mike lanes "shall I go all Sony A1" videos a interesting watch I for one will be interested in how the OM-1 stacks up against the A1 for BIF as it seems that the A1 at the moment is top of the tree in this area from what I have researched whatever the outcome the OM system suits me

What was interesting in this second video was the individual viewpoint of which was perceived to be the best images

View: https://youtu.be/4sp8UwFnYz0
 
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mazdaman said:
Been following Mike lanes "shall I go all Sony A1" videos a interesting watch I for one will be interested in how the OM-1 stacks up against the A1 for BIF as it seems that the A1 at the moment is top of the tree in this area from what I have researched whatever the outcome the OM system suits me

What was interesting in this second video was the individual viewpoint of which was perceived to be the best images

View: https://youtu.be/4sp8UwFnYz0
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.... Mike Lanes is really good imo - Very real-world. And I was relieved to hear that it's not just my limitation that I haven't regained my Canon mojo shooting birds-in-flight on my M1X - It's one of the reasons I'm changing to the OM-1 which I am convinced by all my research will be a major improvement due a number of factors (which I could explain if asked). All these cameras are capable (as Jeff @the black fox continually proves) but some of it is down to individual gelling with their particular camera version.

I have been very aware of how excellent the Sony flagship is consistently reported as excellent in AF + Tracking but I am convinced that the new OM-1 will match it at the very least due to its new technology and it may even be better, at least for the present. Personally I am now invested in Olympus/OMDS having been invested in Canon for many years and will not be changing systems - Plus I simply can't afford to! Besides, does any brand's supertelephoto lens come any better than the Olympus 150-400mm TC Pro? Does a Bear shiit in the woods? I have gelled with that particular lens BIG Time!!

It'll be very interesting to hear what Mike Lanes has to say when he shoots with the OM-1.
 
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I went to my local store, Wilkinson’s in Preston, to handle the new OM-1 and decide whether to pre order. The 5 year warranty is a big plus IMO

I was aware of the specs from the news release and the various Olympus ambassadors/educators etc so it really was to handle the camera.

FWIW my impressions:

  • The body is chunkier than the EM1ii and the surface feels a bit more plasticky
  • The grip is larger and at first felt a bit too big but I think that it would soon become comfortable.
  • The viewfinder is bright and seemed much larger than the EM1. As a spectacles wearer this seemed better – the Olympus rep also wears specs and agreed that he found it better.
  • Hard to tell in the shop if the LCD screen was any better.
  • The focussing seemed really fast and the face detection worked really quickly as people moved around.
  • The Intelligent Subject Detection AF looks interesting. The rep said that users were having some success with the cat/dog detection with other animals and that he had seen a particularly good shot of a bison using it. They were surmising that it may work well on four legged animalsJ
  • With the 40-150 f2.8 attached it starts to become a little heavy but it seemed ideally balanced with the 12-100 f4 – a nice combination


I had a bit of a moan about the price of the battery charger at £120. The present offer includes a spare battery but that seems to me just to get the customer to buy the charger. At the moment I have 2 batteries but I admit that I rarely need to change it within a day’s shoot. However at the end of the day I always put the used battery into the charger, replace with the charged one, and the camera is ready to go at a moment’s notice. This will be impossible with the in camera charging.



The rep thought that all of the incoming units for 7th March would be taken up with the pre orders already made. He thought that anyone ordering now would have to wait until the next batch, hopefully late March/early April
 
mazdaman said:
Been following Mike lanes "shall I go all Sony A1" videos a interesting watch I for one will be interested in how the OM-1 stacks up against the A1 for BIF as it seems that the A1 at the moment is top of the tree in this area from what I have researched whatever the outcome the OM system suits me

What was interesting in this second video was the individual viewpoint of which was perceived to be the best images

View: https://youtu.be/4sp8UwFnYz0
Click to expand...
I've watched both videos, and they are excellent.

I borrowed a friend's Sony A7 and 200mm lens a few months ago and I know that I simply couldn't bother carrying it around due to a bad back. So my choice is between "difficult to focus photos" with the EM1 and "no photos at all" with the Sony.
 
Don153 said:
I've watched both videos, and they are excellent.

I borrowed a friend's Sony A7 and 200mm lens a few months ago and I know that I simply couldn't bother carrying it around due to a bad back. So my choice is between "difficult to focus photos" with the EM1 and "no photos at all" with the Sony.
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I mainly use the omd1-mkiii and 100-400 lens , I stick a spare battery in my pocket and that’s it . No bag it’s a water resistant rig , no tripod or monopod needed due to the i.s and the whole rig weighs 2kg exactly if I want to dispense with the tripod foot and put on a pop up lens hood it’s less than that . There is no other system out there that will give consistent good results that weighs so little..
I have no idea where your getting difficult to focus photos from as I often do b.i.f using the single point a.f and if it’s a nice clear day cluster focus is the only other one . Avoid any of the other multi point a.f modes as there not accurate enough
 
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Have the OM-1 on pre order, currently have 2 64gb Sandisk extreme pro cards 170 MB/s and 300 MB/s, am I right in thinking if I put RAW on the 300 and JPEG on the 170 MB/s card should not have any slow down due to card speed?
 
superpippo said:
I went to my local store, Wilkinson’s in Preston, to handle the new OM-1 and decide whether to pre order. The 5 year warranty is a big plus IMO

I was aware of the specs from the news release and the various Olympus ambassadors/educators etc so it really was to handle the camera.

FWIW my impressions:

  • The body is chunkier than the EM1ii and the surface feels a bit more plasticky
  • The grip is larger and at first felt a bit too big but I think that it would soon become comfortable.
  • The viewfinder is bright and seemed much larger than the EM1. As a spectacles wearer this seemed better – the Olympus rep also wears specs and agreed that he found it better.
  • Hard to tell in the shop if the LCD screen was any better.
  • The focussing seemed really fast and the face detection worked really quickly as people moved around.
  • The Intelligent Subject Detection AF looks interesting. The rep said that users were having some success with the cat/dog detection with other animals and that he had seen a particularly good shot of a bison using it. They were surmising that it may work well on four legged animals.
  • With the 40-150 f2.8 attached it starts to become a little heavy but it seemed ideally balanced with the 12-100 f4 – a nice combination
Click to expand...
.... All very good news as far as I am concerned and just confirms the information already out there and stated by OMDS. Thanks Alan!

As a M1X user with big lenses to balance, I want it chunkier and grippier and will only occasionally remove the HLD-10 Battery Grip if at all.

The AI Tracking isn't literally only for cats and dogs - It's for animals and this has already been demonstrated in the field. The rep needs to get up to speed.

Thanks Alan (y)
 
the black fox said:
I mainly use the omd1-mkiii and 100-400 lens , I stick a spare battery in my pocket and that’s it . No bag it’s a water resistant rig , no tripod or monopod needed due to the i.s and the whole rig weighs 2kg exactly if I want to dispense with the tripod foot and put on a pop up lens hood it’s less than that . There is no other system out there that will give consistent good results that weighs so little..
Click to expand...

I completely agree, although I cannot even carry the 100-400 around for very long. That's why I also have the 40-150 - which can give astonishingly good results if you avoid very high contrast.

the black fox said:
I have no idea where your getting difficult to focus photos from as I often do b.i.f using the single point a.f and if it’s a nice clear day cluster focus is the only other one . Avoid any of the other multi point a.f modes as there not accurate enough
Click to expand...

I'm probably not getting the same results as you because I don't have your experience. However, I'm making far more progress than I expected, so as time goes on, the BiF images will improve, In the meantime, I'm also doing lots of live composites, slow-mo video and other stuff.
 
With regards to the AF systems I do wonder sometimes how pedantic we as the photography community are these days. Not so long ago the D750 was lauded as having a class leading AF system, and tbh it pretty much nailed everything I threw at it. The way 'we' talk about it now you'd think it was hopeless. It's like the EM1-II, pretty much nailed everything, its only weak point being subjects coming directly at the camera, but even then it was pretty decent.

Don't get me wrong, the implementation of things like eye AF help and are nice things to have, but imo only to make life easier rather than actually improving the AF accuracy so to speak.

My point is, I do wonder how much we 'need' these systems or whether it's a case of GAS/marketing making us think that we do?
 
superpippo said:
I went to my local store, Wilkinson’s in Preston, to handle the new OM-1 and decide whether to pre order. The 5 year warranty is a big plus IMO

I was aware of the specs from the news release and the various Olympus ambassadors/educators etc so it really was to handle the camera.

FWIW my impressions:

  • The body is chunkier than the EM1ii and the surface feels a bit more plasticky
  • The grip is larger and at first felt a bit too big but I think that it would soon become comfortable.
  • The viewfinder is bright and seemed much larger than the EM1. As a spectacles wearer this seemed better – the Olympus rep also wears specs and agreed that he found it better.
  • Hard to tell in the shop if the LCD screen was any better.
  • The focussing seemed really fast and the face detection worked really quickly as people moved around.
  • The Intelligent Subject Detection AF looks interesting. The rep said that users were having some success with the cat/dog detection with other animals and that he had seen a particularly good shot of a bison using it. They were surmising that it may work well on four legged animalsJ
  • With the 40-150 f2.8 attached it starts to become a little heavy but it seemed ideally balanced with the 12-100 f4 – a nice combination


I had a bit of a moan about the price of the battery charger at £120. The present offer includes a spare battery but that seems to me just to get the customer to buy the charger. At the moment I have 2 batteries but I admit that I rarely need to change it within a day’s shoot. However at the end of the day I always put the used battery into the charger, replace with the charged one, and the camera is ready to go at a moment’s notice. This will be impossible with the in camera charging.



The rep thought that all of the incoming units for 7th March would be taken up with the pre orders already made. He thought that anyone ordering now would have to wait until the next batch, hopefully late March/early April
Click to expand...

That well-known fast-moving mammal the Bison!
I am astonished at the capability of my Nikon Z9 when in subject 3d tracking mode with my fast-moving dogs - it is (almost) unbelievably good. Having developed my own ability to track fast moving subjects with single point focus with my DSLRsI am finding it is making me lazy - but it is quite liberating to be able to rely on the camera for eye tracking and then concentrate on framing. If the OM-1 gets near this I will be very happy indeed.

The battery charger at £120 doesn't include a battery - you have to order the SBCX-1 kit at £179 to get an extra battery, and this only gives you a £10 saving over buying the battery separately. Nevertheless I have pre-ordered this kit as I see out of camera dual battery charging to be a big plus for me. I do agree that it is very irritating that an external charger isn't included with the camera.

I know it's probably just me but I am amused every time I see reference to the Olympus kit as being heavy. The reason I bought it was for its huge size and weight advantage. It's a system I can carry around me without once thinking about the weight. By comparison my Nikon kit IS huge & heavy and I have to make compromises if I head out with it for personal use.
 
Every tech addition makes the photographer lazy!

Exposure, EV stops and ISO means exposure is nothing like it used to be
Focussing - as you say, much easier now
Lack of film - thousands of shots instead of several dozen
Extraordinary lenses, so the sweet spot of aperture is, well, most stops apart from the really high ones.

It‘s great!
 
snerkler said:
With regards to the AF systems I do wonder sometimes how pedantic we as the photography community are these days. Not so long ago the D750 was lauded as having a class leading AF system, and tbh it pretty much nailed everything I threw at it. The way 'we' talk about it now you'd think it was hopeless. It's like the EM1-II, pretty much nailed everything, its only weak point being subjects coming directly at the camera, but even then it was pretty decent.

Don't get me wrong, the implementation of things like eye AF help and are nice things to have, but imo only to make life easier rather than actually improving the AF accuracy so to speak.

My point is, I do wonder how much we 'need' these systems or whether it's a case of GAS/marketing making us think that we do?
Click to expand...
.... I tend to agree with you but there is a but: Rather than just making life easier I would say that these clever features are more enabling - They offer a higher hit-rate or more success in capturing that picture which your human brain saw and you wanted very much to capture. This is particularly true when shooting wildlife and sports action subjects.

Shooting such subjects is a challenge and apart from developing our individual skills, some of us want to grasp every opportunity we can to successfully capture images which are evocative and give pleasure if only just for ourselves.

Having said that, you could argue that in fact no good photographer actually needs anything beyond the basic 'holy trinity' controls of an early roll-film camera. However, I'm not sure I could manually focus track a top surfer in action throughout their moves, for example.

I view 'marketing' as camera brands proudly saying "Hey! Look at what we have just managed to do and are now offering you!" - It's entirely up to us whether we take or leave it < Unless we suffer from GAS! :D

I often ask myself if I suffer from GAS as it's not an addiction I want to suffer from. I think it's a blurred line. But one thing I do know is that the OM-1 will probably be my last camera as I am soon 75yo and running out of money. I have already bought my last lens, the ED 150-400mm TC Pro and absolutely love it and can't think of anything more I would want from a supertelephoto lens.

This quote was said many many decades ago and is still true today. I have posted it a number of times and make no apology for doing so again :

THE PHOTOGRAPHER MAKES THE PHOTOGRAPH by Robin Procter, on Flickr

[I know that 'Ansel' has been spelt incorrectly]
 
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RedRobin said:
.... I tend to agree with you but there is a but: Rather than just making life easier I would say that these clever features are more enabling - They offer a higher hit-rate or more success in capturing that picture which your human brain saw and you wanted very much to capture. This is particularly true when shooting wildlife and sports action subjects.
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Agreed, modern AF systems do indeed give us a higher hit rate, and also maybe even allow us to do things that weren’t always possible before. However, my point was more about the splitting of hairs with the latest and greatest (y)
 
mazdaman said:
Good news for wildlife shooters Espen has been appointed a OM ambassador like the guys vids and tips

Always has some good tips

View: https://youtu.be/G_i-rY17bXo
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Nice news :)

Now, the camera in his hands he said was the OM-1 but the view of the menu as he went to to talk about some settings was the Mk3 and M1X style Menu structure! I know that some folk criticised that the new Menu structure (akin to the Canon menu that I recall on my 5D3 and earlier models) but do not recall reading that the menu can be changed to show the older style :thinking:
 
Box Brownie said:
Nice news :)

Now, the camera in his hands he said was the OM-1 but the view of the menu as he went to to talk about some settings was the Mk3 and M1X style Menu structure! I know that some folk criticised that the new Menu structure (akin to the Canon menu that I recall on my 5D3 and earlier models) but do not recall reading that the menu can be changed to show the older style :thinking:
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Skullduggery! :LOL:
 
Box Brownie said:
Nice news :)

Now, the camera in his hands he said was the OM-1 but the view of the menu as he went to to talk about some settings was the Mk3 and M1X style Menu structure! I know that some folk criticised that the new Menu structure (akin to the Canon menu that I recall on my 5D3 and earlier models) but do not recall reading that the menu can be changed to show the older style :thinking:
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.... I like Espen's YouTube videos and so am glad he has become an ambassador although it will inevitably bias him slightly. He mentioned he was about to do a training course by OMDS - I think he needs it because the new OM-1 Menu style is very obviously not interchangeable!
 
rockdodger said:
I’m sure he says he giving tips on the old menu system not the new one yes he does but.
Click to expand...
Yes he does say this tip is for the old system but watching the video it seems he demonstrates the tip using the OM 1, he shows the menu in close up so assume he changes camera before
demonstrating the tip, bit confusing though
 
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gramps said:
Skullduggery! :LOL:
Click to expand...

rockdodger said:
I’m sure he says he giving tips on the old menu system not the new one.
Click to expand...

nog said:
Yes he does say this tip is for the old system but watching the video it seems he demonstrates the tip using the OM 1, he shows the menu in close up so assume he changes camera before
demonstrating the tip, bit confusing though
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Hi guys

I have watched it again and yes he did/does say the settings he was talking about were on the previous bodies ~ my foggy brain did not digest that first time around.................I need to pay more attention before posting next time :thinking: either that or stop posting until I get a clearer head....... ;)

PS though if I did the latter I may not end up posting for another week or so........... :thinking: ........... and keep quiet at the back there ;)
 
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