Olympus OM-D E-M5 Preview–New Pro m4/3 ILC Camera; Video & Sample Images Inside

March 07 00:01 2012 by Alexei Rivera Print This Article

The Olympus OM-D E-M5 Micro 4/3 Camera

At an IBM event we attended today, we were lucky enough to bump into Mr. Abe Olandres of YugaTech who was currently checking out an Olympus OM-D E-M5. He graciously gave us a chance to check it out for ourselves and give it a whirl. The OM-D E-M5 is the newest member of Olympus’ popular ILC (interchangeable lens compact) line, but it was not named after the Olympus Pen. The design was based on the imaging company’s popular pro film OM series cameras, which were designed to counteract the bulkiness of Nikon/Canon SLRs. This new iteration, dubbed the OM-D (D for digital) is a new, magnesium-alloy weather-sealed pro Micro 4/3 body just like the Digital Pens, but have much more advanced features – like a new 16.1MP Live MOS sensor, ISO range from 200-25600, 35 autofocus points, 3” articulated 610k-dot OLED capacitive screen (with touch focus and shutter), 9FPS burst, 1080x60i video recording, a ridiculous 5-axis sensor-shift vibration reduction, hotshoe, manual control buttons and dials, and a 1.44M-dot (100% 1.15x) electronic viewfinder to line up your shots. Overall, all these specs make it look like an absolute winner in pretty much any regard, and from what we’ve tried it definitely sits up there. Go on past the jump for a our preview video and some sample images from the camera itself. Enjoy!

Here are some sample shots taken from the camera – no processing done. (ISO 800 & ISO 25,600)

f3.5 ISO 800 1/60sec 12mm Handheld / f3.5 ISO 25,600 1/2000sec 12mm Handheld

And here is another shot fully zoomed in using max ISO.

f6.3 ISO 25,600 1/80sec 50mm Handheld

And finally some comparison shots between the Olympus OM-D E-M5 to our Olympus Pen E-PL1. (Taken with a cellphone, so it’s a little blurry.)

It actually felt like, and looked like our Pen was thicker and bulkier than the OM-D

From what we understand, the camera will be launching in the Philippines soon (maybe this week) and the SRP price will be PHP 59,900 for the body only or a kit with the weatherproof 12-50mm f3.5-6.3 lens will be PHP 65,900. It’s definitely up there in price, but seeing the high ISO shots as well as testing it out for ourselves just makes us think its might just be right for its target consumers.

For more pictures of the device, check out our gallery here.