Having fun with the E-P1

[nostatic]

I got to briefly handle an EP1 w/17mm lens. It was bigger and heavier than I thought - there is a lesson about expectations in there. I didn't get to shoot with it, but maybe will check another one out next week and take some snaps. I just picked up a K7 so I'm budget constrained unless I send that back. It seemed significantly larger than the DLux4 but is thinner than the K7. I do now understand why RF fans love it, and it does strike me as perhaps the best "street cam" out there. Not much bigger/heavier than DLux4 but much bigger sensor. Just what I need, another system...

 

[Hacker]

One negative of the EP-1 is the shutter lag, otherwise, OK.

 

[Friedel]

I also couldn't resist the E-P1. Here a shot I took with this combination:

Sharpness and colours are very good. If you want to see it yourself, here is the original size:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3433/3711904277_b16a97bd8b_o.jpg

Karl

 

[Martin S]

If u think that the stills have good IQ, wait until u try the video. It is quite an experience!! (I haven't done much video).

Used it yesterday with the 17mm. Really nice, and of course, really compact. That focal length seems really good for video.

On Thursday evening, the local dealer had a demo. I shot some HD video with the 4/3 fish eye. Wow, what fun. Had some initial concerns with the the AVI Motion JPEG format since the file didn't open at the dealer. However, I had no problem at home. File opened with Olympus Master 2 (a good example that camera manufacturers should stick to cameras), IMovie, and Quicktime (Mac).

The lack of finder for everything but the 17 mm might make me use the Pen mostly for video, and the G1 for stills.(??)

Martin

 

[JMaher]

Friedel,

Is the picture a jpeg or RAW? If RAW what program did you use? When I bring in the picture and look at it full sized I am seeing a crosshatched or square pattern behind the statues at the top and at the bottom.

Is it just me? I don't think I have ever seen anything like it. The resolution looks great but unless the squares are really in the picture I don't understand what is happening here.

Jim
***
I looked the photo over again. Is it possible there is fine netting covering the carvings to keep birds etc. out? If so forgive me for the questions and add the comment that the resolution is really sharp. If this is not the issue I have a screen capture magnification I can attach.

 

[Terry]

I see it as well. To the extent that it is only in the one area it seemed at first that it was some sort of protective mesh place there to protect the area perhaps from birds. The hard part to answer is where it stops and starts in some areas. I don't think it has anything to do with camera or processing

 

[lambert]

One negative of the EP-1 is the shutter lag, otherwise, OK.

I agree. My main quibble. Shutter lag when pre-focussed is higher than DL4/LX3 and even the DP2. But it seems not to be a problem when using MF mode. I don't understand why there would be a difference.

 

[Friedel]

I can explain it. It is a very fine protection fence against the doves, clamped over the niches of the building. You can see it mainly over the shadow areas of the niches, i think the net has the same brightness as the bright parts of the statues.
I developped the image from RAW with the trial version of Olympus Studio 2, a very slow program, i don't want to use it when LR will be able to handle the E-P1 Raws.
Thank you to all for your interest.
Karl

 

[dougyau]

Couldn't resist anymore and took the plunge today! Totally smitten with this little camera. Image stabilizer works like a charm. Took kids to Disneyland (HK) today and brought the Oly 70-300mm, Pana 7-14mm and the c-mount Carl Zeiss Jena DDR Tevidon 1.4/25. All shots done in jpg with no or minor (curves) post-processing.

Didn't have time to read the manual, menu structure took some time to figure out. More photos at www.flickr.com/photos/dougyau .

Would buy another one in a heartbeat. Just one flaw, no swivel LCD like the G1. Just that one flaw.

Doug.

 

[mod2001]

I agree. My main quibble. Shutter lag when pre-focussed is higher than DL4/LX3 and even the DP2. But it seems not to be a problem when using MF mode. I don't understand why there would be a difference.

turn off the face detection, don't know why, but ist faster then.

Yogi

 

[skimmel]

Couldn't resist anymore and took the plunge today! Totally smitten with this little camera. Image stabilizer works like a charm. Took kids to Disneyland (HK) today and brought the Oly 70-300mm, Pana 7-14mm and the c-mount Carl Zeiss Jena DDR Tevidon 1.4/25. All shots done in jpg with no or minor (curves) post-processing.

Would buy another one in a heartbeat. Just one flaw, no swivel LCD like the G1. Just that one flaw.

Doug.

Beautiful picture Doug. Looks like you may have a G1 and EP-1. How do they compare, image-wise?

 

[Godfrey]

I agree. My main quibble. Shutter lag when pre-focussed is higher than DL4/LX3 and even the DP2. But it seems not to be a problem when using MF mode. I don't understand why there would be a difference.

I'm quite curious about these comments regarding a lack of responsiveness.

I had the DLux4 and E-P1 out on the counter next to each other at the local dealer last week. With the standard zoom on the E-P1, it seemed marginally faster than the DLux4 in terms of shutter lag and certainly faster shot to shot. The E-P1 feels very similar to the G1 in this respect, which in turn feels very much on par to the L1 and E-1 DSLRs.

Our perception of lag and responsiveness is complex. The E-P1 does make a different and more complex shutter sound compared to these fixed lens/leaf shutter cameras. I wonder if that is confusing people's perceptions ... It is a large (by comparison) focal plane shutter which closes, opens and closes, then reopens for each exposure. The sound is inevitably rather different in timbre and duration.

There is also an inevitable slight lag in display refresh if you leave these cameras (G1 and E-P1) in Continuous drive mode. The reason is that C mode forces a short between-frame review for a fraction of a second to the EVF/LCD display buffer where S drive mode does not (if you have AutoReview turned off, of course).

Anyway, I'm thinking out loud. Yesterday I was shooting a bunch of photos with the G1 and L1 side by side, each fitted with a different focal length lens. I saw little to no practical difference in either shutter lag or shot to shot responsiveness, and I am quite certain that the DLux4/LX3 could not keep up with either given those cameras' lack of buffered write capability.

 

[skimmel]

I'm quite curious about these comments regarding a lack of responsiveness.

I had the DLux4 and E-P1 out on the counter next to each other at the local dealer last week. With the standard zoom on the E-P1, it seemed marginally faster than the DLux4 in terms of shutter lag and certainly faster shot to shot. The E-P1 feels very similar to the G1 in this respect, which in turn feels very much on par to the L1 and E-1 DSLRs.

Our perception of lag and responsiveness is complex. The E-P1 does make a different and more complex shutter sound compared to these fixed lens/leaf shutter cameras. I wonder if that is confusing people's perceptions ... It is a large (by comparison) focal plane shutter which closes, opens and closes, then reopens for each exposure. The sound is inevitably rather different in timbre and duration.

There is also an inevitable slight lag in display refresh if you leave these cameras (G1 and E-P1) in Continuous drive mode. The reason is that C mode forces a short between-frame review for a fraction of a second to the EVF/LCD display buffer where S drive mode does not (if you have AutoReview turned off, of course).

Anyway, I'm thinking out loud. Yesterday I was shooting a bunch of photos with the G1 and L1 side by side, each fitted with a different focal length lens. I saw little to no practical difference in either shutter lag or shot to shot responsiveness, and I am quite certain that the DLux4/LX3 could not keep up with either given those cameras' lack of buffered write capability.

I agree that there's a lot of perception when it comes to the "responsiveness" of a camera.

Imaging Resources has performance measures for the G1 and EP1 up:

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/DMCG1/DMCG1A6.HTM

http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/EP1/EP1A6.HTM

Looks like, pre-focused, they're similar speed in terms of shutter lag but G1 focused faster without prefocus. Imaging Resources also noted that a lot of this is lens dependent:

"The Panasonic GH1 was about 3-4 times faster at full autofocus. (The lens likely has a lot to do with that. Unlike the phase-detect AF systems used in SLRs, contrast-detect AF systems require refocusing the lens to determine optimal focus, so the focusing speed of the lens becomes a much larger factor in our measurements. We've heard that the E-P1 does much better when paired with the fast-focusing Panasonic 14-140mm HD lens, but unfortunately didn't have one available to test the E-P1 with.)"

 

[Godfrey]

I agree that there's a lot of perception when it comes to the "responsiveness" of a camera.

Imaging Resources has performance measures for the G1 and EP1 ...

It would be nice if somewhere I could find how they measured these things and how it has changed over time. Their numbers for the L1 differ with my experience of the L1 ... I can think of several measurement methodologies but each has its zone of ambiguity.

Too many numbers. These two cameras, the G1 and E-P1, are too close on the numbers to really get any feel for what's going on. For me anyway. They do feel different, but that difference is more subtle than looking at someone's performance review numbers.

Then the question: is the performance satisfactory or not? I'm sure that's going to vary depending on the perception of the user and the situation of the camera in use. I, personally, have never found autofocus to be particularly fast in perception though it might be faster than my eye in timing numbers.

It's an interesting study in psychology at the end. ;-)

 

[Terry]

A lazy day here hung at the pool a bit......and played with some additional camera settings. I've decided I REALLY like the three choices for spot metering. This shot was done with the "highlight" spot meter. For this setting the camera is assuming what you are metering on is a hightlight that you want to protect. Instead of bringing it back to neutral, it is just making sure it doesn't blow. As you would then expect there is a similar spot meter for use to meter on shadows as well as the normal spot meter. Seems like it can be faster than trying to dial in exposure compensation. Worth trying it out to see if it works for you.

Sorry for yet another shot of the bridge, but it is always availble as a test subject (unless it is too foggy ). E-P1 with 50 lux at about f8. A bit of a curves adjustment on the jpeg. Shot as monochrome and I believe with the red filter enabled.

 

[Diane B]

Interesting Terry. You mentioned it before and it seems as though it could be pretty powerful once one gets the hang of it.

You have the bridge--I have the garden :ROTFL::ROTFL::ROTFL:.

Diane

 

[Godfrey]

Nice to hear that the Spot H and Spot L options are proving useful for you!

I'd have to live with it a while to get the hang of it. I'm so used to using the metering with just Spot mode as it is. Fascinating camera. Come'on Lightroom ... ];-)

 

[Y.B.Hudson III]

yehh...Terry, you should put t' little camera in your purse and go down town...the Avedon show opens @ t' SFMOMA...today

 

[Terry]

yehh...Terry, you should put t' little camera in your purse and go down town...the Avedon show opens @ t' SFMOMA...today

If it is in my purse how can I shoot along the way

 

[Guy Mancuso]

You folks are just lucky you can even go outside. Hit 115 degrees in Phoenix today, even too hot to go outside and take a swim in my pool. I need out of here. Hope it's nice in NY leaving in 3 days. Might have to go to my favorite shopping store B&H, now that is one dangerous place for a gear slut like me.