(FT4) Olympus E-5 and new PEN at Photokina
As you have noticed things have been quiet for a while now. During that time we tried to understand why Olympus didn’t announce any FourThirds camera. Months ago we told you that we were almost certain that new FourThirds cameras would be introduced. What we learned is that in fact our rumors were NOT wrong. The Olympus E-5 was ready for the launch since the end of 2009. Also a new mid-range FourThirds camera was ready for the launch in April. In both cases Olympus made a very last minute decision to not unveil the cameras. According to our sources Olympus discussed a lot about the future development of FourThirds and that probably caused the last minute delay.
So what did Olympus choose?
The Olympus E-5 is now undergoing a new upgrade. I was told that the Olympus E-5 will be released at Photokina in September along with the next MicroFourThirds camera. The Olympus E-5 will have completely new features (some of them never seen in any DSLR camera before!!!). You should again take a look at that patent: double simultaneus focus system. I “suspect” this will be one of the new features inside the E-5.
It is also very likely that the camera will be able to record high-quality video.
So will there be no new camera between now and Photokina?
According to one new source Olympus could unveil the mid-range camera in June. It should be the A6xx. But that’s still to be confirmed.
What I am almost certain about is that Olympus will announce a new $loc = $_SESSION['geoip'];
if ($loc == 'GB' OR $loc == 'UK')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'ES')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'IT')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'AT')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'DE')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'BE')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'AU')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'FR' OR $loc == 'FX')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'NL')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'CA')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
if ($loc == 'US')
{ $sel = "1"; ?>Olympus PEN
{?>Olympus PEN at Photokina. And I also believe there will be one more MicroFourThirds camera (The famous High-End camera) by the end of the year.
Let’s make a summary:
FT4= Olympus E-5 with double focus system and video at Photokina
FT4= One more PEN at Photokina
FT2= A new mid-range FourThirds camera in June
FT2= A new High-End MFT camera after Photokina (Oktober-November)
Reminder: (FT=FourThirds)
FT4= Rumor from good known sources which have been often right in the past
FT2= Rumor from new sources
And what about new lenses? I was told that Olympus is working to deliver the lenses we need. I expect many new MicroFourThirds zooms and primes to be announced at Photokina. I have no news about FourThirds lenses 
Possible future new MicroFourThirds lens list:
Panasonic
- 100-300/4.0-5.6 OIS
- Fisheye 8/3.5
- 14/2.5 pancake
and here comes the future Olympus lenses list:
- 40-150
- 70-300
- 12/2.5
- 20/1.7
- 8mm
- 50mm f/2.0
If you want to share rumors feel free to contact me at 43rumors@gmail.com. I will keep you anonymous of course! If you want me to answer you creat a fake gmail account.
P.S: Big deal on amazon: The Olympus E-P2 with 14-42mm Lens and Electronic View Finder sells for $899 (That’s a -$100 price drop since yesterday!)
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Recent comments
Comment from olympus.wildlifeman: sorry guys just have maxed about my cam....- Comment from olympus.wildlifeman: the esystem 4/3 it is already small enou...
- Comment from olympus.wildlifeman: so i am really sick of the m4/3 crap, i ...
Comment from Picturesbyme: Riiiiiiight........
So Oly will bring a...
Bu
2 years ago |I was hoping the E5 would be a super fast mft PEN and not a larger four thirds offering…
Agent00soul
2 years ago |The 12/2.8 is on my shopping list. And possibly the 50/2.0 too.
G Howard
2 years ago |Oly is “hardly working ” to deliver lenses or did you mean working hard to deliver lenses?
admin
2 years ago |ooooops!
Blaze
2 years ago |What’s the point in making another 20/1.7? Panasonic has already made a perfectly good one.
Zonkie
2 years ago |A 20mm f/1.7 from Olympus? Pity the two m43 manufacturers are mostly “copying” each other’s lenses. It would have been better if Olympus provided a 35mm f/1.4 instead.
The 50mm f/2.0 looks great, though. It will probably be macro and have the optical design of the four thirds one, or so I hope!
Alfons
2 years ago |I thought that the 12mm would be F2.5.
What ever, I would love a F2 version.
BBernhardt
2 years ago |20mm 1.7 isnt that a little redundant?
The 12mm sounds nice, but the 8mm? Is that a fisheye? same as Pana?
No fast portrait is a little dissapointing 50mm 1.2 would be cracking =)
Thanks for the news though, good post!
dMS
2 years ago |Unbelievable, I will have to wait until September? Such a waste of the summer season, Christmas too, because you must wait until the price stabilizes. I hope all this waiting worthwhile and E-5 is capable of delivering high resolution video, high ISO resolution, more DR, 14 to 16 MP, larger LCD, with more dots and keep the optical viewfinder, because there is still nothing comparable.
CR102
2 years ago |I’m rather curious about the “E-5″. The patented dual focus system seems to be designed for fast AF during video recording, which is of no interest to me. Focus accuracy of the E system has been better than that featured by other manufacturers, so I don’t think this is the issue addressed. Now, if the “E-5″ could possibly have more than one image sensor (even a small additional one like the LV sensor of the E-330), a dual focus system could be used to manipulate focus. A camera that can blur OOF surfaces more than is allowed by the aperture and focal length, or put more than one focal plane in focus in low light, would be very interesting indeed. Of course, I don’t know if this is the case. One thing I know is that the only inherent disadvantage of a smaller sensor is in DOF control.
Alfons
2 years ago |Maybe E-5 will have a fixed mirror and electronic shutter? That would be something new.
Duarte Bruno
2 years ago |This is really great! Sory, I meant LAME!
Another Pen before they do the upper m43?
Unbelievable. I’ll probably get a GH2 before that.
And that makes the upper m43 segment:
Panasonic 4 – Olympus 0
Yes, you read that right: G1, GH1, G2, GH2. 4 models!!!! Where the Hell is Olympus?
Miroslav
2 years ago |Some nice rumors at last
. I hope those lenses will be available before 2011., but again there are no models faster than F1.7. And why duplicate 20 mm F1.7 is beyond me …
_Benjamin
2 years ago |So let’s think a little. If they implement double simultaneous focus system in new E-5, how and where can they install flapping mirror, which is needed, if E-5 is still DSLR.?
Pellicle mirror can probably not feed light to OVF + PDAF sensor simultaneously.
Double simultaneous focus + flapping mirror = pretty much impossible in my opinion.
It would work if E-5 is MFT camera
(and has no flapping mirror)
steve
2 years ago |Hopefully the 20mm F1.7 will replace the current 17mm f2.8 as a kit lens. This would reduce costs for those of us who currently prefer the Oly body but are not interested in their kit lenses.
bilgy_no1
2 years ago |I don’t believe there’s an Olympus version of the 20mm f/1.7 coming soon or the m.zuiko 40-150. All the other lenses are on the roadmap, so I don’t see how these two are suddenly rumoured. As others have said: what’s the point of doubling a lens with Panasonic?
If Olympus come up with a surprise lens, let it be a fast portrait lens in the 40-45mm range. I’ve heard lot’s of people ask for that…
BTW I’m not sure the 12mm would be f/2.5. That was the Panasonic 14mm, no details are known about the Olympus 12mm.
Chris
2 years ago |@_Benjamin: What if te E-5 is using the TrineCCD system?
@steve: You hit the nail on the head. Olympus is making their own 20mm f/1.7 because Panasonic’s version is vastly more popular than Oly’s own 17mm f/2.8.
Mazoeca
2 years ago |Ho – hum …. another long wait through the summer ! Glad I still have my trusty FZ50 to keep me company while I stand by !
My hope had been for a mirrorless version of the E-620 or E-30 (updated, of course) to coincide with the release of the 14-150mm — ie a competitor to the G2 ……. seemed to me there would be a certain logic to that scenario.
While my preferred upgrade path would have been to Olympus, at least there is an increasing number of alternative options emerging on the market.
_
2 years ago |@Chris: If they use Trine (triple sensor), there is also no space for mirror (Due to bulky prisms, which must fit inbetween lens and sensors). Maybe there is not enough space even for pellicle mirror too?
Anyway, Olympus has stated in an interview (some time ago) they will not use triple sensor concept.
munio
2 years ago |It seems I am the only one interested in a new mid-range FT body…
I would like to upgrade my 520, but an high-end camera is simply too much for me.
Jules
2 years ago |Every SLR manufacturers have a 50mm, sometimes several. No one questions that, no one complains.
If Olympus plans a 20mm its obvious to me. Panasonic hit the nail right on the same way Olympus did with the EP-1 form factor.
I can already hear the popular demand for having it a full stop faster, but thats an other issue…
jt
2 years ago |I’m thinking the E5 will be the last regular sized 4/3. Everything else will be micro 4/3. It just does not make sense for Olympus to invest in regular 4/3 when the market wants micro.
jt
2 years ago |Panasonic with a 14/2.5 lens? That’s a dumb lens. Make it 12 mm and it makes much more sense.
Holgs
2 years ago |Typical of them not to release a product when its close to being ready. Flashbacks to the gap between the E1 and E3…
Monty Lemán
2 years ago |Good to finally hear something about the E-5! Interesting that they say it was almost done and then they wanted to make some changes…usually it is not a good sign if major changes are still being made late in the development cycle. What happened to that thing we heard a while back about there not being enough factory time and space to produce sufficience 4/3 and m4/3 models at the same time? Am I remembering that correctly? Did that problem get resolved?
At least pushing the release date back to Photokina gives me more time to save money…
Janne303
2 years ago |Where is my 12-60mm 1.8 lens? I need it now!
wageslave
2 years ago |What is wrong with Olympus? They need to be releasing F/1.4 pro grade zoom lenses. Without fast lenses, all the advantages of four thirds system would be lost. To make my point clear, here’s an example setup of FF with its equivalent FT:
35mm: F/4, 50mm, ISO 800 1/250s
FT: F/2, 25mm, ISO 200 1/250s
These two setups will achieve roughly the same image in terms of DoF and exposure. As you can see, even though we need about 2 stops less sensitivity, we need 2 stops *more* F-stop to achieve the same depth of field and exposure. Olympus also needs to work on their sensor. High ISO noise (really anything above ISO 200) and DR needs a major improvement. I really wish for a sensor that has a native ISO 6400 with acceptable ISO 3200 and really good ISO 1600.
If the E-5 ever comes out, I hope it retains the sleek no-knob pro look of the current E-3, still with an articulated screen (920 dots please!) with an even brighter OVF. Also, the buttons and menus needs more user experience testing.
e_dawg
2 years ago |Guys, I believe this is ALREADY in use in Olympus 4/3 cameras. There is a setting called Hybrid AF which can be used in Live View only. It’s faster than pure CDAF, which is painfully slow, but doesn’t compare to really good CDAF for Live View like we see with the G1/GF1/GH1 cameras.
e_dawg
2 years ago |Guys, I believe the “double simultaneous AF system” is ALREADY in use in Olympus 4/3 cameras. There is a setting called Hybrid AF which can be used in Live View only. It does exactly what is described in the patent: flips up the mirror to use PDAF to quickly get a rough estimate and then uses Imager CDAF to do the fine AF. It’s faster than pure CDAF, which is painfully slow, but doesn’t compare to really good CDAF for Live View like we see with the G1/GF1/GH1 cameras.
Roger
2 years ago |I’d really like to replace my E-510 with the next gen E-620/E-30. It sure looks to be a very long wait… I’m not interested in an MFT camera.
MD
2 years ago |Olympus’ 1.7/20 should be a 1.4/25 (or even a 2/25) which would fit much better in the overall lineup: 12, 17, 25, 50
A 2/50 is perfectly fin with me, if it is optically close to the 2/50 FT and faster in AF.
sonchai
2 years ago |You won’t see E-5 till’ 2012 lol j/k
it’s end of the road for 4/3 not M4/3
Olympus and Panasonic rumors » Blog Archive » (FT4) Panasonic LX5, GH2, GF2, AG-AF100 and one more surprise?
2 years ago |[...] LX5, GH2, GF2, AG-AF100 and one more surprise?Leica will not join MicroFourThirds (via Steve Huff)(FT4) Olympus E-5 and new PEN at PhotokinaRumors from others: Sony NEX to be announced on Tuesday. New Samsung NX camera very soon. And Leica [...]
Mazoeca
2 years ago |There are frequent references on 4/3 Rumors to a “High End MFT Camera” to come from Olympus some time later this year. What are the main features/characteristics of this camera likely to be? Any speculations or rumors out there?
Maz.
ggweci
2 years ago |Is the assumption that the new Pen will be the E-P3? if so, is there any chance of it having a built-in flash? how about a higher resolution screen?
Vinod
2 years ago |Where is 14-150 F2.8-3.5 lens for 4/3s?
Picturesbyme
2 years ago |Riiiiiiight……..
So Oly will bring a super cam in September…
By the time it is available and it’s on shelves… (well….see how many stores sells them now…) Canikon will bring out an even better and newer one…
As much as I wanted the new E5 I decided to get the gear what’s available NOW and not only in people’s dream. No regret so far. Nailed focus nearly all the time and sharp images to the last pixel.
I’m not saying I wouldn’t buy an E5 once it is available for a decent price because the lenses are great but right now you can get a Canon 7D for 1300-1500 (got one for 1250) a D300S is about the same price.
If Oly rolls out the E5 how much that will be? 1600-2000? By that time you can get a 7D around 1000 and the D400 D800 and 8D is going to be either out or about to get out to compete with it….
Oly really needs to wake up and start hiring some sane marketing people because the ones they have now… wow…
olympus.wildlifeman
2 years ago |so i am really sick of the m4/3 crap, i bought a pen and had a nice looking point in shoot in my hand, that i had to change lens on, it is a step back in technology with
olympus.wildlifeman
2 years ago |the esystem 4/3 it is already small enough.. i guess the next one will be called the pin and u can put it in your thimble and we will have to shrink our fingers to use it, the thing is that if u have a big customer backing ya cant leave them high and dry.i shoot a e 620 .. gf has a e520 and ya cant go wrong why not just up date.. and i dont care about hd vid if i did id buy a video camera not a dslr.
olympus.wildlifeman
2 years ago |sorry guys just have maxed about my cam.. and i dont wanna be a CanKon member hate them both…i find most people i know with a canon or nikon are the people u see at the golf course with the nice taylormade golf clubs, that are always hollaring mulligan, the are the people that stand behind there camera for protection,,,we have all heard it, should have went nikon , look at the d90 i just bought, yay, u r all the same people haha olympus friends we all gotta stand together, we know what is better about our cams, im a rugged guy and i rock a rugged cam thanks.