Good news for the Olympus company: Tokyo exchange were extremely “gentle” with the company. Olympus has to pay a penalty of  $129,800 only to remain listed on the Tokyo Exchange. Electronista reports: “The light penalty was based on the belief that just a handful of staffers had been responsible for hiding Olympus’ losses and that the core of the company was safe.”

Meanwhile Reuters reports that Sony is on pole position for an Olympus tie. -> every week someone else is in “pole position” :)

And Olympus announced a new firmware upgrade for PEN cameras. It adds compatibility with the new [shoplink 27977]12-50mm[/shoplink] power zoom lens. To upgrade follow those instructions:

1. Simply launch the included Olympus camera software and connect the camera via USB cable to an Internet connected computer. Choose the Update function from the Camera menu in the software to apply available updates for camera bodies, lenses and accessories.
2. Download the software updater from the following link: http://www.olympusamerica.com/cpg_section/cpg_downloads_updater.asp and follow the installer instructions.

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P.S.: Thom Hogan wrote a nice article about the right size-weight-quality balance of mirrorless cameras at Sansmirror (Click here).

Good Morning!

I woke up and found 285 unread messages in my mailbox (See image on top)! Some of them are rumors and I hope to be able to post some of them today. Many emails are messages related to my personal post (Click here) I wrote yesterday. I am surprised you liked it, I had a lot of troubles if it would be right to post a personal message or not. But I guess you are really interested in my potatoes and wine project :) I will try to answer every single mail but first I will work on the rumor front.

Rumors: I was worried that with all that hype we might would be disappointed once the REAL camera is out. My “feeling” now is that there is really an imrpovement or evolution coming along the OM release.

Stay tuned!
Your Admin :)

Although I do not participate a lot on the 43rumors discussions (because I have no time) I see that many readers still don’t know who I am and how this website works. So I am trying to explain a little bit of myself and my work on 43rumors to help you to get an idea :)

This website is amateurish:
The first thing you have to keep in mind is that I am not a professional journalist, I am not a native English speaker and I never had English at school. This is just a small blog which relies on an unprofessional but very passionate work. That’s it. I don’t get paid by photo companies, I have a “normal” work as photographer and filmmaker which makes me travel a lot. That’s why for example I have no time to participate at the discussions on 43rumors.

My skills:
I speak German (main language), Italian and Spanish. I learned Portuguese and I am learning dutch and french right now. English is the last language I “learned on the fly” during my various trips (for example in USA where I still have to go 1-2 times per year for work). I studied, architecture and engineering at high school, cinema-philosophy-psychology at University. My dream would be to study physics but I guess this will remain a dream.

Why I started the blog:
As I told you I travel a lot. My main themes are war and economy. I spend a lot of time in Colombia, Bolivia, Rwanda, Uganda and I always had to travel as light as possible. When Olympus and Panasonic announced the launch of the Micro Four Thirds system I recognized that this could become my future working stuff. I needed something small, and a camera that I can use for both photography and video production. I was looking for news about the system but there was zero coverage about it. At that time I knew I had to stay home for at least six months because my mother was sick.  I spent my time to start a personal blog to collect the news. I was surprised to see people was visiting me regularly and website was growing. I renamed the blog 43rumors and it became what it is now.

Problems with the 43rumors popularity:
With increasing popularity I got in some big problems. First my language skills and time availability are very limited. With increasing amount of work I now have to spend a couple of hours per day to keep this website running. At least two times I was that close to shut down the website. I once closed it for two weeks but than readers convinced me to restart the blog. While working in stress situation I also did some mistakes (and I still do sometimes). And the biggest problems happened the last months when family issues kept me busy and I really came close to a burn out.

How I intend to work on 43rumors in future:
Two times I tried to work with some people that could help me but for many reasons it didn’t work out. The recent family issues convinced me that I have to find serious people that can help me out. It will work like that. They will work on 43rumors sister websites (like Mirrorless Rumors for example) and I will link to them regularly. In exchange they will help me whenever I am on travel or having other busy moments. But I will ALWAYS be the only one having access to my sources and to the mails. So rumors will always come from me alone!

About Cameras and Photography
A camera doesn’t matter if it comes to take great pictures. A camera only matters for me because it makes me easier to take that kind of picture is want to take. m43 is perfect for my work in countries where I have to walk a lot. A GH2 makes me easier to take videos and pictures at the same time. I use regularly my [shoplink 28308 ebay]E-P1[/shoplink] and I will use it for many years in future. My favorite camera is the [shoplink 28309 ebay]Mamiya 7 (Click here to see on eBay)[/shoplink] because it helped me to reduce the amount of “stupid” pictures I take (Main reason why: 1 picture = 1 Euro!). So while I like to talk about future cameras and technology I want you to know that no camera will ever make you a better photographer. So buy only a camera when you need it and when it meets your expectations. Example, I will probably buy the Olympus OM camera because it’s build like a rock and it’s weather sealed. Could be a perfect camera for my next Ecuador trip!

Personal stuff: The things I learned from travelling
Honestly, travelling doesn’t change you a lot. If you are an asshole you will remain an asshole :) What I really learned from my trips, in particular from the many months spent in the Amazonas is that I am a very limited person, with many fears. I learned that live is much bigger than our fears and hopes, and that there are many unexpected surprises. So never be sure of anything, and never give up. Life is much bigger than what others are telling us, what teachers are teaching us.

Personal stuff: How I imagine my future life
I know life is short and that all what matters is my relation with the people I love and the nature that surrounds me. The only hope I have is to have a peaceful live for me and the person I love. And I wish to never loose my sense of curiosity which makes me always keep an “open” look on the world. There are still so many things to see!  I keep those words from Blake deep in my soul:
“To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.”

My very next goal is to find a place where I can have my own terrain to grow potatoes and wine-grapes. I want to own many animals, and to play music almost every day. Of course I want many children…at least three ;) That’s it. Everything else that comes will be a beautiful extra in my life ;)

I hope you got an idea of who I am. Let me know if you have some questions. I am always online today!

Just for fun guys: This is a Olympus OM-D design made by blog.livedoor.jp. It’ based on the current rumors and looks like a mix between the [shoplink 28222 ebay]OM-1[/shoplink] and [shoplink 23568]E-P3[/shoplink]. But that grip doesn’t look that nice for me. Would prefer no grip at all :)

Panasonic announced a new firmware updated for the new [shoplink 26836]GX1[/shoplink] camera and the 100-300mm zoom lens. You should soon be able to download the firmware at http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/dsc/. For some mysterious reasons the download is still not available but the new features are already here:

DMC-GX1
-Enhancement in the performance of AWB
-Enhancement in the performance of [AFF] (AF Flexible) and [AFC] (AF Continuous)
-Improved stability when used with the SD Memory Card complying with UHS-I
-Addition of [STEP ZOOM] and [ZOOM SPEED] in the setting of [Fn] (Function) button and [Q.MENU] -Reflection of [DRIVE MODE] settings to [CUSTOM SETTING] -[MENU RESUME] in each menu tab
-Page flip in the menu tab with [DISP.] (Display) button

LUMIX G VARIO 100-300mm / F4.0-5.6 / MEGA O.I.S. (H-FS100300)
-Improved performance of O.I.S. (Optical Image Stabilizer)

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Jordan Steele (Click here) posted a new GX1 review: “for still imaging, this is easily Panasonic’s best compact style CSC to date, and rivals the flagship of the Lumix line, the GH2, in everything but video. Outstanding.”
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For USA readers: The Silver GX1 body only is in Stock at Amazon (Click here) while the black body will be in Stock within 3-5 weeks again at Amazon (Click here). More Panasonic GX1 search links: [shopcountry 26836].

Imagin Resource (Click here) had a long talk with MR. Darin Pepple, Senior Product Marketing Manager, Imaging at Panasonic Consumer Electronics Co. Here are some of the interesting points:

– Again Panasonic explains the advantage of m43 over the NEX system: “it allows us to produce really small lenses, still extremely good optical quality, and at the same time make small bodies.” Edge detail of NEX lenses suffers from lens size.

– He confirms that Panasonic is “seriously” following the hacked GH2 improvements: “Yes, you can go outside that with some hyped-up features and firmware updates and that sort of thing, but then you’re outside the normal specification, and for us as a manufacturer, we really have to stay within it. ”

– About the new lenses: “By this time next year I hope to come back to you and say, ‘Look at our lens line-up now. We’ve added four or five more lenses.’ ”

– Panasonic says real innovation is coming not from Full Frame but from small sensors. Those technologies will be implemented in future m43 cameras. It sounds like the future GH3 camera could have BSI technology!

– Panasonic doesn’t believe a big sensor in a compact camera makes sense. They will not go the same path with the LX5 successor as the Canon G1 X.

In summary: When reading the interview you really feel how “video” is very important for them. There is also no plan to create a new system with bigger sensor as the market really focused on sub-fullframe sensors size. Panasonic approach is more “little steps” forward instead of looking for big revolutions. They have a very practical and rational approach and this is also something I like. As I always said, the first problem with Panasonic is their management. It is not possible that every time they release a new product you have to wait up to 6-7 months to get them! P.S: Easy to guess that the next products they will announce are the LX5 and GH2 successor :)

Image courtesy DC.watch

Kenko announced a new T to m43 mount adapter which will allow you to use that super 400mm f/8.0 Tokina lens (800mm full frame equivalent). There is no official price and release date yet but the adapter should cost around $200-$250. P.S.: There are many such mirrorless lenses made by [shoplink 28248 ebay]Opteka (they also go far to 1.600mm!)[/shoplink].

A short CES recap:
Panasonic showed two camera prototypes: A head camera (Click here to see the pic) and an unspectacular WIFI compact camera (Click here to see the pic).
Hands-On With Olympus’ New Digital Cameras (ePhotozine).
Panasonic stand at dpreview and Dc.watch.
Olympus stand at dpreview.