Olympus E-PL5 Black Digital Camera with Black 14-42mm Lens

Comments about Olympus E-PL5 Black Digital Camera with Black 14-42mm Lens:

I've come from DSLRs to Micro 4/3 and love the system - I also have a Lumix G5 which is a great cam as well.

I got the E-PL5 to allow me to REALLY downsize as I'd been intending to do, but without compromising output quality too much. It really delivers!

The small size might not be suited to those with larger hands as the buttons and dials are quite small and a bit fiddly. Fine for me but worth mentioning as a warning. The body feels solid and well made and the tilt frame for the screen very firm and positive in action. It can tilt right up over the body for self-facing shots or filming, the orientation sensor knows to flip the image.

Start up is fast, shutter lag VERY low and the images it produces are really nice indeed. The JPEG engine turns out excellent looking images and RAWs need very little noise reduction even at high ISO. I've mounted some long "legacy" lenses to it as well (up to 400mm) and the pics look like they came from an SLR - great colours, micro-contrast and tonality. It needs a viewfinder to use with them really though, for balance and manual focusing reasons!

I bought it with the 14-42 and 40-150 lenses to mainly use as a "carry round" though and both lenses are really nice for the price - probably fair to say they both punch well above their weight. A few signs of CA in the 14-42 round the edges in high contrast areas but excellent sharpness.

Handling is generally good. I prefer the grip to be fitted - it looks good on the black one too - and the ability to assign "myset" customisation to the modes on the main dial is a great idea, so Program mode can be high colour 4:3 format JPEGs, Manual mode might be RAW at low ISO in 16:9 (you can still change things as you go of course and there are plenty of parameters can be applied).

Using the kit lenses, AF is quick and positive, and the ability to use the touch screen to either direct the focus point or actually focus and shoot is really handy, especially on a tripod whilst doing landscape shots.

Also very impressive is the ability to rattle off 8 frames per second in RAW + JPEG for 15 frames before lockout (using a Sandisk Ultra SD). It then allowed short bursts again after only a few seconds. You can set it to disable the IS during a burst, which helps achieve the frame rate.

Speaking of the in-body stabiliser, it's not as effective as the 5 axis one in the OMD but still does a good job - maybe 2 stops worth of "help". With legacy lenses you can also manually specify the focal length in use to allow it to be more effective. Tried it - it works!

Battery life is excellent. It was a few days after the first charge before I had to charge again. The meter isn't very useful though - only appears at start up and the drop off is quite quick so can catch you out. Best to have a spare!

A quick mention too for the "Art Filters". Normally I'd never even look at features like this but they genuinely are creative and fun (I'm still not likely to use them much, mind!)

OK enough of the plaudits, what are the niggles?

Well, as already mentioned the controls are small and fiddly. Not an issue for my smallish hands but could be for some. The screen is quite exposed and would benefit from a protector, but you must use one for touch screens. The flash is a little weedy and not built-in either (and only comes in silver!). Once fitted you CAN control compatible flashguns with it BUT you can't fit a viewfinder - you also can't fit a larger flash if you use an EVF with the E-PL5.

Video quality is decent but can be slighty affected by the stabiliser. It's also a bit limited in options compared to Panasonics offerings. Fine for occasional clip shooting though which I think most users will do?

Dynamic Range is still not as high as on a(current equivalent) APS-C camera BUT in use I don't think most users will notice except in extreme situations.

And finally, the menu system is a bit of a slog to get through if you're not used to Olympus! You also have to turn on the option for the more comprehensive settings, which are many and could be quite daunting to the casual user (probably why it's "off" by default!). using the mysets to customise it helps a lot, and the quick menu on the LCD can handle most general shooting options.

So, in summary, its a very powerful camera in a very small and convenient package, with great image quality all the way up to ISO6400, lots of customisation options, fast AF (still not there with tracking though), good burst and buffer and generally a pleasure to use, with surprisingly good kit lenses to boot.

If you can handle the small form factor and fiddly controls, and don't need to track fast moving subjects then this camera is in my view a great purchase. No regrets whatsoever (but sort out the EVF and Flash issue will you, Olympus!!)

It's a shame the ratings only go in whole stars as it's a 4 1/2 really (or 9 out of 10) for me!