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Olympus OM-D hands-on preview
By Ed Godden
Product news
21 February 2012 16:30
Last week I was fortunate enough to fly off to Amsterdam and get a sneak peek at the new Olympus OM-D. I may have only had a day to get to grips with the pre-production model but this was plenty of time to judge for myself the capabilities of this mirrorless Micro Four Thirds camera.
Taking its design straight from the traditional OM camera, it’s definitely aimed at serious photographers with a creative attitude. At first glance it could easily be mistaken for the film camera.
As a self-confessed arty snapper, I’m completely sold when a camera has a selection of creative art modes as its selling point, and the OM-D most definitely falls into this category. The options I found myself using the most were the Dramatic Tone (colour and black & white possibilities) plus the cross process tool. Both of these create bold and punchy effects. Just choose these wisely when shooting certain subjects.
With its sturdy magnesium alloy body and compact frame it really is a piece of kit that’s built to last. But only when I had the battery grip attached did it truly feel like the traditional OM camera. I guess size does count!
The touchscreen for selecting modes, choosing focus points and actually taking the shot is a great feature, although I did find its sensitivity not quite as responsive as other manufacturers.
The guys at Olympus took us on a whistle-stop tour of the city allowing us to test the camera out in different shooting situations. After a couple of hours getting used to working my way through the menu system we stopped off to test the focus tracking capabilities and high ISO range at a skate park. It was also a good chance to try out the 9fps burst rate. After a few minutes of shooting I was starting to have a few technical gripes with the camera. First off I found the camera quite noisy at higher ISO levels. And I also thought the write time to the memory card was quite slow. I hadn’t noticed it until now, as I hadn’t been shooting burst of images. This could of course be the fault of it being a pre-production model and the memory card I was using not being the most up to date. The focus-tracking however was more than adequate in this low-light action scenario and allowed me to capture a selection of images.
With an ISO range expandable to 25,600, a 16MP Live MOS sensor and an extremely clear EVF (electronic viewfinder), what you see is most definitely what you get. I look forward to getting the full working model in my hands and testing it over a few days… rather than just a few hours!
Body only (£999) With FREE grip
Body & 12-50mm kit lens (£1149) With FREE grip
Introductory prices if bought before the end of April. UK only.
www.olympus.co.uk