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Olympus Reboots OM Series For Digital, OM-D E-M5 Is Retro Looks With Future Tech

That slice of friggin’ gorgeous right there is Olympus’ long-awaited entry into the professional market with its ground-breaking Micro Four Thirds interchangeable lens compact series. These cameras, unlike DSLRs, lack a mirror assembly, which cuts down on noise and drastically cuts back on size. Instead of the mirror, they rely on a live view feed to compose your images, often with the rear LCD. They offer most of the advantages of DSLRs in a package that can be notably smaller, especially in the lens department.

But, up until the past year or so, they’ve had a few weak areas. Auto-focus speeds, since they lack phase-detect AF, have been a mixed back, leaning towards slow. a problem which Olympus has soundly put to rest with the focus speeds of its third generation Pen bodies (E-P3, E-PL3, E-PM1), whose AF perform rivals–if not bests–my D700′s.

And then there’s been the matter of that live view thing. A lot of pros don’t like the idea of composing with an LCD, which forces you to hold the camera in an unsteady away-from-the-body stance, and can have issues in daylight. Some bodies have had built-in EVFs (electronic viewfinders), or optional ones, but they’ve been so-so to merely good. The OM-D E-M5 seeks to solve that as well, building in a new breed of high-resolution EVF with an impressive 120fps refresh rate. We’re still looking for the specs on res, but if they haven’t stepped back from their last optional ones, then the enhanced refresh rate should make this start rivaling an actual prism viewfinder.

So, what else is up with this new beast? One, it looks like a film SLR. A lot like it. But it’s small. Tiny. Not much bigger than the E-PL3 (and only then because of the viewfinder), and smaller than the Panasonic G3 overall. It’s made of magnesium, and sees the return of Olympus’ much-renowned weather-sealing (just look back through this blog to all the times I used my naked E-3 in the rain if you’re curious about how good that reputation is). The body is fully weather-sealed, as is the grip. The sealing is only complete, however, with a weather-sealed lens. of which there are few currently. The recently-announced 12-50mm is one. The newly announced 60mm f2.8 macro (true 1:1) is another. And more will likely be coming.

Additionally, there are dual control wheels on the top deck, like most advanced DSLRs, stylishly reworked to match the classic aesthetic. Above the viewfinder and below the hot-shoe you’ll find Olympus’ advanced accessory port, so this’ll continue to support awesome accessories like the LED macro light. The available HLD-6 grip is modular, and you can install a chunkier front grip, a vertical grip, or both. Both extra grips have a release and command dial built onto them. Like the NEX system, a small slip-on flash is provided, but none is built-in otherwise.

Specs on the E-M5 are equally swank past the body. It’s got a 16.mp Four Thirds sensor (2x crop), a revamped AF system that can read the image at 240fps during continuous drive to work its contrast-detect magic, 3D tracking (a la Nikon) added to the AF system, a world’s-first 5-way in-body IS system (horizontal, vertical, pitch, yaw, roll), 9fps in continuous high mode, a 3″ 610,000 dot multi-touch OLED tilt-screen, a TruePic VI image processor, ISO 100-25,600, and the usual compliment of Oly art filters. You get scene modes as well as PASM, and of course there’s raw support too.

To support the new OM-D (OM Digital) line, which Oly is seeing as a step-up form it’s existing Pen series, there’re two new lenses and a new flash announced too. The lenses are both primes, a 75mm f1.8 telephoto (150mm equiv), and a 60mm f2.8 macro (with a magnification scale instead of a distance one). The new FL-600R flash has a GN of 36 at ISO 100, a built-in LED so it can be used for lighting video, and wireless control so it doesn’t even have to be on your camera.

The OM-D E_M5 will be available starting at $999.99 body only, in silver or black. $1,099.99 will get you it in a kit with non-weather-sealed 14-42mm II, or $1,299.99 for a kit with the weather-sealed 12-50mm power zoom.

Interested in getting your hot mitts on one of the new OMs? We don’t blame ya, but we do suggest you hit the link below to get on our preorder list. Or, hit the jump for pictures of everything and the press release.

http://robertscamera.com/om-d-e-m5-body-only.html

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Dreams Keep Coming True: Fuji Announces X-Pro 1 Interchangeable Lens Compact System

 

Did you manage to forget it’s CES week? Yes? Well, time to snap back to reality there, buckos. And ready to help ease that sting, Fuji has finally announced it’s long-rumored interchangeable lens system follow-up to the runaway successful X100 compact. Back for more is a seriously retro rangefinder body that almost drips elegance, and an APS-C (1.5x crop) sensor. But this time, it’s got a lens mount and a fledgling lens system (three primes will be available at launch: an 18mm f2.0, a 30mm f1.4, and a 60mm f2.4 macro).

Inside Fuji’s first ILC (or EVIL, if you prefer that old forum term) is a 16 megapixel CMOS sensor, which Fuji is calling a “APS-C X-Trans CMOS sensor.” The X indicates this new system family (including the compacts, we assume), and is reflected in the addition of a new, never-before-seen X-Mount for the lenses. The X100′s Hybrid Multi Viewfinder returns, offering you the ability to switch from an optical rangefinder to a high-quality EVF with the flick of a switch on the front of the camera. There’s a focal plane shutter that tops out at 1/4,000 of a second (only one-stop slower than most professional DSLR bodies). If you guessed there’s probably a 3″ LCD around back, you’d be correct, and it has a resolution of 1.23k dots. Looks like it’ll also chug along at 6fps in continuous drive mode.

As with the X100, everything here is metal, for that rock-solid feel of the rangefinders of yore. additionally, the finish has been changed to a matte black for all you pros out there who like to keep things discreet.

And, where would Fuji, legendary film manufacturer be, without including tone presets that emulate its classic film types, including the legendary VELVIA. Heck, it’s even got a specil film mode brakcet, so you can take the shot in several film effects and pick your favorite later (presumably for those of you not doing a raw workflow.)

The three lenses (XF18mmF2 R (27mm equiv), XF35mm R f1.8 (53mm equiv), and XF60mmF2.4 R Macro (90mm equiv)) will all have manual, metal aperture rings with clicks at each third stop, for modern level control in a retro feel. Apparently a feature of the X-Mount (and thus lenses) is a recessed flange-back distance (up to 7.5mm) where the lenses sits into the body, reducing the overall assembled length.

For accessories, there’ll be the by-now near-obligatory leather half-case (LC-XPro1), a hand-grip (HG-XPro1), and a dedicated flash unit (EF-X20)

No prices have been announced on anything yet, and we’ll update you as soon as that changes.

Press release after the jump.  Preorder starts here.

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Panasonic’s GX1 Is The Pro Update To The GF1 We’ve Been Wanting

It was a very exciting day back in September 2009 when panasonic announced the DMC-GF1, the first entry in the new Micro Four Thirds product range that seemed geared at pro photographers. Unlike Olympus’ consumer-geared Pen series, and Panasonic’s own DSLR-shaped G series, the GF1 was sleek, compact, and full of knobs and buttons, invoking a very rangefinder-esque aesthetic (and as such becoming very popular with shooters who’d been looking for a good body to mount all their old Leica M glass on).

Then, the GF2 came out, and it was a bit less exciting as Panasonic made it clear the line was moving closer to the Pen series. And with the GF3, almost all the controls had disappeared, leaving a lot of shooters feeling a bit unhappy, and longing for a proper replacement to that GF1.

And, today, we finally have it, in the form of a new, third line from Panasonic: the GX1.

For those of you remembering the GFX1 kit, where that X stood for the inclusion of a power zoom lens, you’ll be rewarded to know the X continues to indicate that this body has been optimized for those power zoom, HD video-oriented lenses. And, to support that, the video recording is finally up to a full 1080 AVHCD, being drawn from a new, higher resolution 16 megapixel sensor.

So, what exactly is new in this long-awaited body otherwise? Well, the ISO cap has scooted all the way over to 12,800, it has dual-axis level gauges (as well as an orientations sensors, we hear. The GF1 relied on information from OIS lenses for this, and non-OIS lenses left you rotating your portrait shots yourself), and there’s a new (and improved, we’re guessing) external viewfinder in the form of the DMW-LVF2. The LCD is disappointingly the same size and same resolution (that 460,000 dot resolution has been a bit long in the tooth for a while now), but you do get to add touchscreen now, for what you think that’s worth. Updates to the AF cycle rate also promise AF speeds up to 10% faster than their last generation, and who knows how much faster than the two-gen old GF1.

As for the rest, how about an easy-to-read comparison table of key specs? You got it.

Spec GF1 GX1
Megapixels 12.1 16
Frames per Second 3 4.2
ISO 100 – 3200 100 – 12,800
HD Video 720 1080
LCD 3″ 460,00 dot 3″ 460,000 dot
Touschscreen No Yes
Focus 23 Area 23 Area
Advanced Hotshoe Yes Yes
Raw Yes Yes

The GX1 will be available in three kits: body only, with regular 14-42mm, and with the new power-zoom 14-42mm, starting maybe sometime next month. More pictures and press release after the jump.

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Nikon Announces Nikon 1 V1

Up second for today’s announcement-palooza from Nikon for its new 1 system is the V1 body, which is the higher-end body for this new interchangeable compact mirrorless system. It’s got the same 10.1 megapixel CMOS sensor with that 2.7x crop “CX” format of the whole 1 system. It’s also got the 73 AF points using the hybrid contrast/phase detect system to achieve what Nikon is claiming to be the world’s AF system. You also get the 100-3200 ISO range with the 6400 push, and the 10fps/60fps with AF lock shooting speeds.

New to the V1 over the lower-level J1 are things like a 921,000 pixel LCD instead of the more pedestrian 421,000 pixel one, an all metal body build, an integrated EVF with 1.44 million dots of resolution, a flash hotshoe (though not on-axis, boooo), a mechanical shutter in addition to the electronic one (giving you a shutter speed range of  30 – 1/4000 with the mechanical), and stereo mic input.

Thanks to the advanced port and hotshoe, the V1 can take an external flash unit (the SB-N5) or a GPS unit (the GN-100), both custom-made for just the V1.

Following the Jody Factor, the Nikon 1 V1 comes in Henry Ford’s favorite color, black. Presumably only with matched black lens for the kits. As I understand, there’ll be several kits for the V1, including one with the standard 10-30mm VR (27-81mm equiv), one with the 10-30mm VR and a 10mm f2.8 pancake prime, and one with the 10-30mm VR and a 30-110mm VR (81-297mm equiv). Prices start at $899.95 for the one lens kit and go up to $1,149.95 for either two lens kit.

Press release after the jump (same as the J1):

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Nikon Announces New “Nikon 1″ System, Starting with the J1

Nikon today has finally come clean with its long-rumored mirrorless system, dubbed the “Nikon 1″ system. The system so far consists of 2 bodies and 4 lenses, with an additional flash unit and GPS module available for the higher end body.

Getting us started is the Nikon 1 J1. Snazzy name, I know. The J1 is the more “entry-level” of the two bodies, and features a 10.1 megapixel sensor with a 2.7x crop. Yup, 2.7x, or what Nikon is calling the new “CX” format. Like their FX and DX systems, any image stabilization to be had will be in-lens and not in-body. You see the picture around back on a 3″ LCD with a low-end 461,000 dots of resolution. The body is mixed metal chassis with composite parts, so, it’s a bit more rugged that your average entry-level DSLR, more on par with Nikon’s D7000 for build.

It seems that the thing to do for any new entry into this interchangeable lens compact market is to brag about having the world’s fastest AF, and Nikon doesn’t drop the ball. The Nikon 1 system is launching with a 73-point AF system that uses a hybrid process of switching between contrast-detect and phase-detect methods as needed to back up this newest claim to the world’s fastest.

The dial on the back only shows P&S style scene modes, but the specs table says there’s PASM up in here, so, we’ll have to get further clarification on that. It may or may not have proper manual modes. If it does, you’ll be diving through menus for them, though.

On the plus side, the J1 can pull off 10fps at full rez with AF every frame, if you lock AF at the onset you can get 60FPS (!). Additionally, there’s a Smart Photo Selector mode that’s shoot 20 photos at 30fps, discard everything with notable “bad” qualities, then look through the remainder for photos with “good” aspects and keep the best five for you.

The ISO range is 100-3200 native, and pushes to 6,400. Probably a reasonable stopping point giving the uniquely small size of this sensor for Nikon. The J1 includes a small built-in flash with a guide number of 5, and has no accessory port to expand upon this.

And, of course, the system does shoot 1080 HD video, and records to the now standard SD/SDHC/SDXC format.

The Nikon 1 J1 will come as a kit with a VR 10-30mm f3.5-5.6 (27-81mm equiv) lens in black, silver, white, red, or pink for $649 or so. And, as a bonus, the 10-30mm will be color matched to the body, for you fashion-conscious folks. (Or, if you and your buddy plan this, you can get two colored kits and swap lenses to rock that svelte two-tone look.)

Read more in the press release after the break:

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Panasonic generates X series electronically focused lenses

Isn’t there something missing? Naw. It’s just in a collapsed state. Similar to the design of Olympus’s M.Zuiko 14-42 I and II, Panasonic’s LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 14-42mm/F3.5-5.6 ASPH./ POWER O.I.S. stores itself for enhanced portability and compactitude. Yup, compactitude.

This new designation, X, indicates this and the LUMIX G X VARIO PZ 45-175mm/F4.0-5.6 ASPH./POWER O.I.S. are electronically focused, you know, like camcorders or point and shoots. The GF3x, when it ships, will be a good, wholesome GF3 bundled with the X 14-42.

 

More photos after the break.

 

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Sony Announces Pro-Geared NEX-7 EVIL


Sony is expanding its NEX line upwards with the new NEX-7. Notable (and welcome) additions to this pro-geared NEX model are a fatter, chunkier grip and a built-in 2 million dot 0.5″ OLED electronic viewfinder. The kind you actually put your eye up to when you want a more stable shooting position and to block sunlight so you can check framing and exposure better. Right there on the back, next to the usual 3″ LCD.

The NEX-7 appears to share similar 24 megapixel sensor as the A77, but tops out at a piddling 10 frames per second (it fixes both AF and AE at the beginning on continuous shooting, unlike the Alpha models). The simple controls of the other NEX models expand for the better on the NEX-7, with the addition of two command dials on the top shoulder in addition to the jog wheel around back, forming what Sony is branding (because Sony, like Apple, brands everything) its “TRINAVI” user interface.

The LCD around back is the same 3″ 921,000 dot found on this entire generation of Sonys, and it’s of the tilt flavor. The “Photo Creativity Touch” mode is gone here, Sony assuming if you’re after a camera of this spec you’re probably not looking to have your hand held along the way. The body will be made of well-finished metal, like the other models below it. The NEX-5 felt like it could be used to beat up muggers in a pinch, and then document the incident for the cops after, and I expect no less from this NEX-7. All the usual Sony features are shoved in there as well (3D, Sweep panorama, 1080 video, smile detection, yadda yadda yadda.) There’s no in-body IS on the NEX seires, you’ll have to look to the new lenses if you need to fix those caffeine jitters (like yours truly).

The NEX-7 seems like a really cool camera, and later this year you’ll be able to find out if it lives up to the specs for $1200, or $1350 if you need an E mount 18-55 to get started. Hard core pros, though, might skip the 18-55mm until they’ve read about some of the new lenses announced for the E system in my next post.

Pictures and press release after the jump, as always.

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Sony Updates NEX-5 with NEX-5N

Next up in our day of announcements is the Sony NEX-5N, which suggests that this is more a tweak to the NEX-5 than an actual replacement model. Which means I’ve got to dig up a comparison table here for you all.

But, before we get into that, some information about the NEX series. The NEX cameras are Sony’s interchangeable lens compacts, sometimes called EVILs (Electronic Viewfinder, Interchangeable Lens). These cameras lack the reflex mirrors of DSLRs, but have DSLR sensors. As a result, they have DSLR quality in smaller, compact bodies, but lack an optical viewfinder. The lack of viewfinder is handled with full-time Live View via the rear display, or with electronic viewfinders that use smaller displays to mimic the traditional optical viewfinder.

So, now then, the NEX-5N:

/tr>

Spec NEX-5 NEX-5N
Megapixels 14 16.1
 Sensor Size  APS-C (1.5x crop)  APS-C (1.5x crop)
 Mount Sony E  Sony E
 LCD  Tilting 3″ 920,000 dot  Tilting 3″ 921,600 dot
 HD Video  1080  1080
 3D/2d Sweep Panorama  Yes  Yes
 Continuous Shooting  7fps  10fps
 ISO  100-12,800  100-25,600
“Photo Creativity Touch” No Yes

So, that’s the bulk of the notable stuff. That “photo creativity touch” is a simplified display menu to help people unfamiliar with the technical aspects of photography to get better photos by controlling things like depth-of-field and not things like “aperture.” Sony’s also claiming the AF performance is improved over the non-N model. The NEX-5 uses all NEX accessories, including the older Alpha lens adapter and hotshoe mounted electronic viewfinder. Although, you’d probably rather use the newly announced ones, which add a translucent mirror and AF to the mount adapter and switch the EVF over to a stupidly sharp 2 million dot OLED one.

The NEX-5N will cost either $600 or $700, depending on whether you need an E-mount 18-55mm or not. More pics and press release after the jump.

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New Olympus E-P3 and Olympus 12mm MFT F2.0 are here!

The wait is over.  The new E-P3 from Olympus arrived today and it doesn’t disappoint.

For those folks who already have a Micro 4/3 camera from Olympus, specifically the E-P1 or E-P2; the differences are very noticeable.  First, the screen is amazing.  The 3-inch OLED screen is very sharp and the color will knock you out.  A far cry from the previous models.  The other obvious difference is the speed of the auto focus.  Wow.  This thing is fast!  Testing with the kit lens and the new 12mm proved as fast as any SLR I have tried.  Auto subject tracking and face recognition proved dead on as well.  Olympus was also nice enough to include a pop-up flash on this model.  A much needed addition and something I really miss on the E-P2.  The touch screen interface on the OLED screen is a nice feature too.  You can make easy adjustments to color, exposure, saturation, etc without needing to go into a menu to do it.  It is all on the right side of the screen and does not interfere with the view.  A real nice package.

The new 12mm MFT f2.0 is a lens that those of us in the Micro 4/3 camp have really been waiting on.  It is a very solidly built lens with a clutch to switch to manual focus on the fly.  The depth of field on the lens looks great!  It reminds me of the old Voigtlander lenses in it’s construction and in it’s sharpness.  Really feels like an old rangefinder when you use this thing.

We’ve got them in stock today.  Come on in and test one out for yourself!




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