43 Rumors – Page 1896 – Panasonic and Olympus Digital Camera News

New CEO’s for Olympus and Panasonic.

February 28, 2012
news
16 Comments

What a timing! Both m43 partners announced a new CEO and President.

Olympus named Hiroyuki Sasa (medical equipment marketing) as president and Yasuyuki Kimoto (Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp.) is the new chairman. Sasa said: “My duty is to win back as soon as possible the trust from everyone and repair this damaged brand.” (Source: Engadget)

Panasonic named Kazuhiro Tsuga new CEO of the company. He was the one guy pushing Panasonic to support Blue-ray in the famous HD-DVD versus Blue-ray battle. You know who won :) So this may be a good sign for his talent. (Source: Engadget)

Anyway, hope both companies can recover from their recent financial (and not only) issues.

Silver or Black. Which E-M5 did you preorder?

February 27, 2012
news
134 Comments

I am in terrible stupid troubles :) Should I get the Black or the Silver E-M5? The Silver probably looks better with silver lenses and reminds me more of the [shoplink 28222 ebay]OM film camera tradition[/shoplink]. But the all black version looks very sexy and less….”old”. Looking at Amazon US ranking (Click here) buyers seems to like both equally. So I ask you, which one (and with or without lens) did you preorder?

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If you ask me why I still haven’t preordered the camera yet the answer is easy…I haven’t found any preorder option in Belgium yet.

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Full Preorder list:
1) Black E-M5 body at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Warehouse UK, Redcoon Germany and Amazon Japan.
2) Silver E-M5 body at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Warehouse UK, Redcoon Germany, and Amazon Japan.
3) Black E-M5 body with 14-42mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto and Amazon Japan.
4) Black E-M5 body with 12-50mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Jessops, Redcoon Deutschland, Amazon UK, Amazon Deutschland and Amazon Japan.
5) Silver E-M5 body with 12-50mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Jessops, Amazon UK, Amazon Deutschland and Amazon Japan.
6) FL-600R wireless flash at
Amazon, Adorama and BHphoto.
7) MMF-3 Four Thirds adapter at
Amazon and Adorama.
8.) HLD-6 power battery holder at
Amazon, Adorama and Amazon Japan.

Sonnetar 25mm f/1.1 Prototype spotted!

February 27, 2012
Rumors
41 Comments

Great news guys! The genius Mr. Miyazaki realized the first prototype of the Sonnetar 25mm f/1.1 for Micro Four Thirds! For those of you not knowing who the creator is you have to know that he has a long history of handmade and nice quality M-mount lenses. An example, he made that super nice and compact [shoplink 29386 ebay]Leica Triplet lenses (Click here to see them on eBay)[/shoplink]. The sonnetar protoype has a multi-coated lens, is only 25mm thick and weights 67g only! That is the design of the lens:

KTF-Turbo (Click here to read the google translation) is now testing the lens and you can already see the first image samples (Click here). I let you judge the image quality. I find the bokeh very… harsh :)

The lens you see here on top is a not available for purchase yet and price is unknown although I suspect it will have the same price of the [shoplink 29387 ebay]Sonnetar 25mm f/1.1 for Pentax Q mount ($650 here on eBay)[/shoplink].

One more news: Photoshop launched the new App for the iPad (Click here to see it on iTunes). This really sounds like an amazing app!

Patent: New Olympus 17mm f/2.8 II coming? (Photoshop for iPad)

February 27, 2012
Rumors
107 Comments

The japanese blog Egami (Click here for the google translation) spotted that new Olympus patent describing an updated version of the current [shoplink 14798]17mm f/2.8 pancake lens[/shoplink]. The lens has an improved optical performance. Egami also noticed that usually Olympus announces 6-12 months after a patent has been published. This means the lens could be announced within the year.

One more news: Photoshop launched the new App for the iPad (Click here to see it on iTunes). This really sounds like an amazing app!

Impressive! Pekka Potka tests shows the E-M5 high dynamic range and efficient 5 axis IS.

February 26, 2012
reviews
210 Comments

The dynamic range graph posted by Pekka Potka.

Pekka Potka posted a double E-M5 test on his website (Click here). First, he measured the dynamic range and found that the new [shoplink 29074]Olympus E-M5[/shoplink] has a 2 EV advantage over the [shoplink 23568]Olympus E-P3[/shoplink]! Soon other websites like DxO or Dpreview will post their reviews and if they can confirm Pekkas results than this is actually an impressive step forward!

And he also tested the new five axis Image stabilization and he is again impressed by the results.

More I look at the [shoplink 29074]Olympus E-M5[/shoplink] more I think that this time Olympus did it right! After almost three years of product reiteration we finally have something really new :)

Now it’s up to Panasonic to impress us with the future GH3!

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Full Preorder list:
1) Black E-M5 body at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Warehouse UK, Redcoon Germany and Amazon Japan.
2) Silver E-M5 body at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Warehouse UK, Redcoon Germany, and Amazon Japan.
3) Black E-M5 body with 14-42mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto and Amazon Japan.
4) Black E-M5 body with 12-50mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Jessops, Redcoon Deutschland, Amazon UK, Amazon Deutschland and Amazon Japan.
5) Silver E-M5 body with 12-50mm lens at
Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto, Jessops, Amazon UK, Amazon Deutschland and Amazon Japan.
6) FL-600R wireless flash at
Amazon, Adorama and BHphoto.
7) MMF-3 Four Thirds adapter at
Amazon and Adorama.
8.) HLD-6 power battery holder at
Amazon, Adorama and Amazon Japan.

One more full size image sample with the Nokton 17.5mm f/0.95

February 26, 2012
reviews
61 Comments

Yakinik posted one more full size image sample taken with the GX1 and the new Nokton 17.5mm f/0.95 lens on Flickr (Click here). It has been taken at full aperture and it looks not bad at all! The only thing that doesn’t look good is the high price. Until now I only found two preorder options in German ebay stores at [shoplink 29368 ebay]Digitalhandel (Click here)[/shoplink] and [shoplink 29367 ebay]Bayern Fotoversand (Click here)[/shoplink]. Both for 1.299 Euro.

Meanwhile the other Nokton 25mm lens is getting a tiny bit cheaper. It’s available for 712 Euro on [shoplink 29370 ebay]eBay (Click here)[/shoplink] or for 718 Euro at Amazon France (Click here).

Last day of Olympus US deals

February 25, 2012
deals
4 Comments

This is the last day of the Olympus USA deals (You can see them here below). Despite that the “old” E-PL1 remains the most sold mirrorless camera at Amazon (Click here to see ranking). No surprise seen that it cost $100 less than any high end compact camera. And here are the info about the discounts:

PEN rebates

$50 price drop on all Olympus E-P3 bodies and kits at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$100 price drop on the Olympus E-P3 double lens kits at Adorama (Click here).
$50 price drop on all Olympus E-PL3 bodies and kits at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$100 price drop on the Olympus E-PL3 double lens kits at Adorama (Click here).
$75 price drop on all Olympus E-PM1 bodies and kits at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$125 price drop on the Olympus E-PM1 double lens kits at Adorama (Click here).
$50 price drop on all Olympus 9-18mm lens at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$100 price drop on all Olympus 75-300mm lens at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).

Four Thirds rebates

Olympus E-5 body $100 price drop at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$50 price drop on all Olympus 14-54mm lens at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$100 price drop on all Olympus 70-300mm lens at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).
$30 price drop on all Olympus 35mm lens at Amazon (Click here), Adorama (Click here) and BHphoto (Click here).