Micro 4/3 Olympus E-M5 II

bartjeej

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Olympus OM-D E-M5 II Review

Looks verrry pretty, sounds like a decent improvement. The 40MP mode is absolutely useless for handheld photography but seeing it blow away the Nikon D810 in terms of moire is pretty cool!

That EE-1 dot sight they mention, which can be used on any camera, sounds like a really cool thing to have for wildlife photography - I wonder what it looks like! If it's small and / or collapsible, I might just get one at some point!
 
I have just had a look at the E-M5 II on DP Review and it does look really good. The new EVF and screen plus dial and button layout look good. It's a sexier camera for sure!

I have downloaded and compared the std and 40Mp images to see if there were any difference. The std image is 4608 pixels on the longest edge where the 40Mp image is 7296 pixels on the longest edge. There seems to be more detail in the larger but if you reduce the 40Mp image down to the same 4608 pixels of the 16Mp image there seems to be very little detail difference, there is some but not much...to me anyway! When reduced down to 2048 pixels on the longest edge (my end result for posting on the web) there is no difference that I can see! I guess once out in the real world I will notice the difference more and it is a cool feature to have.

I do like the comparison between the 5II and the D810, Very cool!!!! The way the sensor shift works is very clever and will make for superb landscape, scenery, macro, product images. If you can get the model to stay completely still for 1 second then portrait work should be on the list too!

As long as they have not taken away any other features then this will be a very decent replacement for the Mk1 but would it be better than the E-M1??? If you don't do sports then I guess the smaller, lighter E-M5II would be a better choice.

Only having to purchase the HLD-8 grip is good too!!
 
I love the look of the camera. It's a closer visual approximation to the classic OM film cameras than the last model and that's a very good thing in my book. I never liked the bulky 'hump' of the original EM-5 and I see they've done a neater job this time. I'm sure the controls would suit me very nicely too.

The problem for me is the sensor. I far prefer a 3:2 aspect ratio for most images, which means if I bought an E-M5 I'd be forever cropping away the top and bottom of the image and wasting those valuable pixels.

-R
 
The E-M5 Mark II really is a very nice upgrade but I really don't think I'll be bothering to buy one. For one thing, the high-resolution mode is pretty much only for tripod work. There are other improvements as well but I just don't feel the urge to replace my original E-M5 with the Mark II. Maybe an E-M1 on closeout.
 
I love the look of the camera. It's a closer visual approximation to the classic OM film cameras than the last model and that's a very good thing in my book. I never liked the bulky 'hump' of the original EM-5 and I see they've done a neater job this time. I'm sure the controls would suit me very nicely too.

The problem for me is the sensor. I far prefer a 3:2 aspect ratio for most images, which means if I bought an E-M5 I'd be forever cropping away the top and bottom of the image and wasting those valuable pixels.

-R

And even then you're not getting a true 3:2 aspect ratio. If you compare a 3:2 and a 4:3 file shot of the same scene, the 3:2 will be wider and not as tall - the 4:3 narrower and taller. If you just crop a 4:3 down to a 3:2, you still have that narrower 4:3 width with the tops and bottoms chopped off. Aspect ratio is a big thing to me - I really prefer 3:2 for most of what I shoot. I just see better with that frame, the exception being portraits or extreme telephoto sports or wildlife shooting, where I'm just as happy with 4:3.

That said, I like a LOT of what m43 brings to the table, aspect ratio aside, and have sometimes thought about augmenting my Nikon gear with another m43 body with 2-3 longer lenses, probably the 75 and something like the 75-300 for more extreme reach than I can get with my Nikon (at least in a lens I'd ever be willing to hold). But I really prefer the flip-up screen to a fully articulated screen, so the EM5 II wouldn't be on my radar for this reason alone. I'd probably just go with a used or refurb EM1 or EM10. But it probably won't happen. I"m really digging the simplicity of having one system camera body to choose from. There's nothing in full frame I like as much as I liked the Olympus 75 with the Olympus face detection, but I do OK with a 120 or 135 on the Nikon...

-Ray
 
If I could afford it I would probably buy one. I love the articulating screen, tactile features on the knobs and such. I would probably use the 40 mp feature on landscapes which is only about once a year. Love the looks, sexy..
 
i didn't bother to read about the features for a camera I'm not going to buy. But how do they get 40MP out of a 16MP sensor? Surely an upres in software is as good (or better) than one done in camera.....right?

And I'd get the silver....with a silver 75mm lens.;)
 
They're sort of combining 8 shots to one, by shifting the sensor 8 times during a second. Which explains the tripod need. It's not software upres.

So it's basically using the IBIS system PRO-actively rather than only RE-actively. Pretty cool idea. Can't imagine I'd use it much at all since I almost never carry or use a tripod, but a cool trick and probably really useful for some folks...

-Ray
 
Nice camera, but no tripod for me also. So at least 5 stop IBIS is good:

imaging-resource - Resolution Wars: Can a 16mp Four Thirds camera out-resolve a 36mp full frame?
nikon-em5II.jpg

While the two images are fairly similar in most respects for overall sharpness and clarity, the one clear difference is the lack of moiré in the E-M5 II on the green label, where the D810 produces obvious moiré artifacts. The results at ISO 1600 are equally interesting, even here with in-camera JPEGS and default noise reduction settings. The shadow area at the top right tends to produce ISO noise in most cameras by this time, and while the D810 handles it about as good as most any camera we’ve tested, the E-M5 II also handles it surprisingly well and even produces slightly sharper results in the mosaic tile pattern.
 
The best thing about the MkII

... is that is has driven the Mk1 price down so much that today I got a brand new E-M5 Mk1 with a 12-40 Pro zoom for only $100 more than price of the zoom alone! :eek:

I am very happy as I have wanted a WR outfit for a couple of years and finally have got it. Now it doesn't matter if the weather is raining or shining!

I'm sure the MkII will make a nice upgrade when the MkIII comes out ...
 
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