From Digital Camera World · · 3m
A thousand photos in Berlin with the OM System PEN
A pocket camera with flagship tricks turned a first trip to Berlin into a thousand-frame street shoot.
In brief
A pocket camera with flagship tricks turned a first trip to Berlin into a thousand-frame street shoot. The PEN is not built to be the best at any one thing, it is built so you can shoot anything with whatever you happen to be carrying. Originally reported by Digital Camera World.
New city, new camera
James Artaius flew to Germany for the OM System PEN launch, landing in a city he had never seen with a camera nobody had used yet.
“What's more fun than visiting a cool city you've never been to before? Visiting a cool city you've never been to before with a brand new camera.”
Packing blind
Not knowing the PEN would arrive with a new 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 III kit lens, he packed the 12-40mm f/2.8 Pro for a 24-80mm equivalent walkabout range.
A telephoto smaller than a can
He added the 40-150mm f/4-5.6 R, an 80-300mm equivalent slimmer than a soda can, plus the cookie-sized 9mm f/8 fisheye body cap for fun.
“because it's literally the size of a cookie”
The kit lens won
The Pro zoom came out only indoors, for the extra 4mm wide or the extra stop in the dark. The tele got used for isolating distant subjects, and little else.
Instantly familiar
After more than a decade shooting Olympus and OM gear, he felt at home on a camera he had never touched before.
PEN-F meets E-P7
It handles like a cross between the cult-classic PEN-F and the smaller E-P7, and performs a lot like the OM-5 Mark II it shares specs with.
“a cross between the Olympus PEN-F (a "holy grail" camera that has become a cult classic) and the Olympus PEN E-P7”
Entry price, flagship guts
At $999 / £849 / AU$1,499 it reads as entry level on paper, but it inherits computational tools from the OM-1 and OM-3 that rivals do not offer at any price.
80MP from 20MP
High Res Shot uses the 5-axis stabiliser to shift pixels across multiple frames, pushing the 20.4MP sensor to 50MP or 80MP. Static subjects only, or you get artefacts.
A filter that isn't there
LiveND simulates up to four stops of neutral density with a live preview, so you get blurred motion without screwing glass onto the front of the lens.
“you can achieve creative slow shutter speed effects without needing a physical ND on your lens”
Faces, even from behind
On the street, human subject detection held focus on faces, and on the backs of heads and bodies when people were turned away.
Handheld in the dark
With 5.5 stops of in-body stabilisation, even the tiny f/8 fisheye stayed sharp handheld at slow shutter speeds, no tripod involved.
Finish it in camera
Colour and mono profiles plus Art Filters gave crunchy Leica-like black and white, popping graffiti colour or faded 35mm looks, then straight to the phone. No editing required.
“You make the magic in-camera, there's no need for post-production if you don't want to.”
The bottom line
The PEN is not built to be the best at any one thing, it is built so you can shoot anything with whatever you happen to be carrying.
