New XZ-1 review at Digitalrev and Rollei 50mm lens test.

What a nice Olympus XZ-1 review. I like that guy and I like the narrative style. In that video he compared the Olympux XZ-1 with the Canon S95. See the video to hear the conclusion!
You can get the XZ-1 at [shopcountry 19904] (Click on shop name to visit the direct product page).
For comparison. That’s the price of the Canon S95 at [shopcountry 21015].

For the first time I saw a Rollei lens tested ona Micro Four Thirds camera. You might be interested to see the results at DC.watch (Click here). They tested the [shoplink 21016 ebay]Rollei Planar 50mm f/1.4[/shoplink] on the new Olympus E-PL2. That’s what I like most of Micro Four Thirds, the fact that you use almost any existing lens. Canon seems to not understand that (See MirrorlessRumors.com).

See the [shoplink 21016 ebay]Rollei 50mm Planar lens on eBay (Click here)[/shoplink].
Olympus E-PL2 price checks at [shopcountry 18844].

Look at that crazy Fuji X100 eBay auctions (What makes a camera such successful? What should Olympus and Panasonic learn from it?)

[shoplink 20939 ebay][/shoplink]

Look at that crazy price people is going to pay for the first Fuji X100 camera listed on [shoplink 20939 ebay]eBay (Click here)[/shoplink]. The seller is probably becoming rich :)
The price went up to US $2,292.31 and there are still three days left! There are now two more X100 on sale on eBay from [shoplink 20999 ebay]Hong Kong (Click here)[/shoplink] and [shoplink 21000 ebay]Singapore (Click here)[/shoplink]. Those cameras will be sold for 2 or maybe 3 times the real price of the X100 which is 1199 Dollar/Euro (Check at [shopcountry 19929]).

What I am questioning now is WHY a camera can become that popular. It doesn’t take interchangeable lenses, it’s not cheap, it has not a particularly amazing sensor. A wonder what Olympus and Panasonic should learn from that X100!DO you have an idea?

P.S:: You can see a dissembled X100 at Petapixel (Click here). And there is a first X100 review at Photographyblog (Click here).

 

Tons of new reviews (GF2, GH2, E-PL2, E-5 and XZ-1)

Nice to wake-up in the morning and see that there are a dozen of new Panasonic/Olympus camera reviews. It will take a couple of hours to read them all :)

Panasonic GF2

Digitalcamerainfo (Click here) posted a 21 page long Panasonic GF2: “With a simplified design, touchscreen operation, emphasis on its Intelligent Auto mode and—perhaps biggest of all—a debut price that is $300 cheaper than the GF1, the GF2 is aimed squarely at those consumers looking to step up from a point-and-shoot without losing portability.
Camerguide (Click here) also posted a new GF2 review: “Smaller, lighter, and now touchscreen friendly, Panasonic has done its best to introduce a wider range of photographers to its “GF-series”. There’s no question that the changes do make the GF2 more appealing to photographers with less advanced skills, and nobody can fault Panasonic for trying to make the camera smaller, the question perhaps should be whether the touchscreen adds to the experience of using the GF2 for either set of photographers, be they more or less skilled.
GF1 vs GF2 comparison at Mobile01 (Click here).
GF2 direct links to [shopcountry 17361].

Olympus E-PL2

Pdnonline (Click here) tested the Olympus E-PL2: “Though it may not be the prettiest PEN camera in Olympus’ line-up, the E-PL2 has so many picture-taking improvements from previous iterations, it’s clearly the best.
Popphoto (Click here) tested the E-PL2: “In our opinion, the E-PL2 is one of the better ILCs on the market. It takes advantage of the now-wide array of lenses available for the Micro Four Thirds system while offering a compact and powerful body with the best features that Olympus has developed for this still-young format.
ThePhoBlographer (Click here) made a E-PL2 RAW File Test.
Focus Numerique (Click here) tested the Olympus E-PL2.
BHphoto (Click here) explains how it is using the Olympus EPL-2’s Art Filters To Shoot a Concert.
E-PL2 direct links to [shopcountry 18844].

More reviews

There is a short Olympus E-5 review at Dpexpert (Click here): “Professionals who are satisfied with nothing less than a full frame sensor may not buy what is, in effect, a half-frame camera. But consider this: in terms of body integrity and features the E-5 at $2200 will stand comparison with a Nikon or Canon costing many thousands more. And Olympus lenses are superb.”
Panasonic GH2 tested at Optyczne (Click here).
Neocamera (Click here) posted an Olympus XZ-1 review: “The Olympus XZ-1 is a compelling entry into the advanced compact category with a rich feature set. The ultra-bright F/1.8 wide-angle lens combined with a relatively large CCD sensor lets this model produce some of the best images to come out of a compact digital camera for a given scene. Dual control-dials enable efficient use of manual controls which include manual focus, manual exposure, spot metering, bracketing, custom white-balance and white-balance fine-tuning. The dual-port hot-shoe supports an optional tiltable EVF to provide eye-level and waist-level shooting, as well as supporting external lighting.
XZ-1 direct links to [shopcountry 19904].

 

That’s it!

My Olympus 17mm gets reviewed :)

[shoplink 14798][/shoplink]Almost 80% of my pictures have been taken with that cheap and unspectacular lens. It’s not as fast and as good as the [shoplink 14796]Panasonic 20mm f/1.7[/shoplink] but it’s cheaper, lighter, tinier and has a more interesting wider view angle (that’s just my personal opinion). I am glad that someone finally reviewed the lens. That “someone” is Photographyblog (Click here): “Its sharpness and resolving power are pretty good, especially in the centre of the frame, but they are hardly exceptional for a prime lens“…”Overall, we enjoyed shooting with the Olympus M.ZUIKO Digital 17mm f/2.8 a lot – there are few lenses out there that beat it on the portability front, while its angle of view and fast maximum aperture make it an excellent walk-around lens“.

Click those links to check the Olympus 17mm price at [shopcountry 14798].

Olympus XZ-1 gets an “Editor’s choice” at Photoreview Australia.

[shoplink 19904][/shoplink]

It looks like the most popular Olympus camera is not a PEN and not a the E-5 but the [shoplink 19904]Olympus XZ-1[/shoplink]. As you know it features also a PEN-type accessory port that can use PEN system accessories, including the clip-on VF2 EVF or the FL-14 and FL-36R flash guns and the external stereo microphone adapter kit (SEMA-1): “Image files from the review camera were a cut above those from most other digicams we’ve reviewed, including those from Olympus. Files were clean and not over-processed and colour saturation was restrained for a small-sensor camera. Autofocusing was comparatively fast for a contrast-based TTL system and when face detection was engaged, the camera was able to pick up and track human faces almost instantaneously.”. The only real drawback is the video quality.
The camera gets an oveall score of 8.8/10 which is pretty high!

You can get the camera in Black or White at [shopcountry 19904] (Clcik on shop name to directly visit the XZ-1 product page).

Does the GH2 Extended Tele Converter affect the video quality?

M43photo made a very interesting Tele Converter test on the GH2 and 14-42mm lens. The ETC mode gives a tele conversion of 2.6x when recording 1080 lines in and 3.9x in 720 lines (Video mode).

As you can see from the image samples on the website: “It appears that the video stream recorded using ETC has worse image quality than the normal stream, at all ISO values. There is some lack of sharpness and contrast, and more noise in the ETC video streams.

M43photo explains the (little) quality loss with the fact that ETC recording doesn’t have the option of scaling down from a larger number of pixels (in normal recording mode the whole sensor area is used and scaled down).

I suggest you to make your own tests. Let us know if you can confirm the conclusions from m43photo! Thanks!

P:S.: GH2 direct links to [shopcountry 16254].

UPDATE: A good friend of us (and very good tester) said:
The extender 2,6 function depends on the optic that is used. The [shoplink 14794]Leica 45mm Macro[/shoplink][/shoplink] gives the same frame quality in extender mode as a HI Q optics. The same for [shoplink 14822] 7- 14 mm. Both tested result! The 14- 42 is the weakest lenses in the Panasonic lens set. So the result can be right but the result is not easy to apply on other optics

Head to Head: Panasonic 100-300mm vs Olympus 75-300mm lens. Which is the best?

Olympus and Panasonic are not only partners inside the Micro Four Thirds world but also very strong competitors. So let’s compare some of their camera and lenses. Today you have to chose between the Olympus 75-300mm and the Panasonic 100-300mm lenses. There are not many reviews out there and I can give you only a few useful links:

Olympus 75-300mm

Photographyblog (Click here)
Diwa labs
Image samples at Olympus website
Customers reviews at Amazon US (There are no user reviews in European Amazon stores).
Price and availability checks at [shopcountry 15861].

Panasonic 100-300mm

Diwa labs
Outback Photo.
Image samples at Panasonic website.
Customers reviews at Amazon US, Amazon DE, Amazon UK.
Price and availability checks at [shopcountry 16261].

And now the big question:

Considering price, Image-build quality and size. Which lens is the best for you?

View Results

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If you own one of those lenses feel free to add your personal rating at:
43rumors Olympus 75-300mm rating
43rumors Panasonic 100-300mm rating
Reminder: You have to be a registered 43rumors member to add your rating. If you have any registration problems contact me at 43rumors@gmail.com.