Who's buying the Olympus E5?

[Ross the fiddler]

I wish you well Walter & hope you get your new camera soon.

I was alerted to a guy (TimWcanon), being a Canon user, bought an Olympus E5 (previously had an E620) & did a comparison between it & the Canon T2i (on DPReview) & he has a close preference for the E5 giving it a very favourable comment, now he has to decide which one to keep. Here is his comment:

CANON VERSUS OLYMPUS

I posted a message on this forum a few days back after receiving my E-5. I had mentioned I am a long time Canon user (and VERY satisfied) but I also like trying other systems on occasion. I had purchased an E-620 with a 12-60 lens awhile back and was extremely impressed with the image quality. The E-5 has definitely been a step up from that in quality and I had mentioned some of the reasons I had these thoughts.

For the past several days I have been doing what I abhor….pixel peeping comparative shots between two systems. I have always been of the bent that the final product hanging on the wall is what counts and have generally stayed away from looking at a level of detail that my eye would never probably notice when printed anyway.

I used my Canon T2i (image quality is generally felt to be like the 7D) with a battery grip and my favorite walk-around lens; the 17-55 F/2.8 image stabilized. I made comparative shots with the Olympus E-5 and the 12-60 ( I might add that I think the 50mm F/2 Olympus lens (best lens for the $ I have every tried) is even better than the 12-60, but I wanted to use a somewhat comparable telephoto lens). I shot primarily low light or indoor natural lighting in my usual photographic manner. I did try to keep both systems using the same shutter speed, aperture setting, and focal length for the comparative shot. I shot several hundred pictures with both systems in RAW and then sat down at my computer to compare.

My workflow generally involves Lightroom 3 (raw conversion) and CS5. I generally make lens corrections, may do some level adjustments, apply some noise reduction if necessary, add some sharpness if required, and then perhaps do some minor tonal tweaks in PLightroom (clarity)…it is very subjective and totally dependent on my eye.

Here are some of the general conclusions I reached for myself:

White Balance

Both systems did a great job but I felt the Olympus system did a bit better….not enough to make a substantial difference. The E-5 does a much better job than the E-620.

Focusing

Both systems were fast and generally very accurate. I did notice when pixel peeping that the few times there were some focus issues, and they were very minor, they occurred with the Canon system. The Olympus generally was perfect.

Exposure

Canon seems to expose more to the right than the Olympus. Once you get use to each lighting environment it is not difficult to adjust the exposure in the Olympus to more than adequately compensate. One thing I did observe in post processing was that bringing up the exposure a small bit in the Olympus image did not really reveal a lot of shadow noise or other degradation of the picture. In other words, it is a phenomenon that can be fixed by understanding the camera in various lighting demands and making the appropriate adjustment or in post-processing.

Color rendition

I had both systems set to Adobe RGB color space. Color was probably the starkest difference between both systems to my eyes. The Olympus had just a bit more saturation and “punch” in their colors. This is certainly something that could be adjusted in the Canon or Olympus in camera or in post processing. I found the Olympus output to be a bit more pleasing but this is shaving hairs.

Ergonomics

I can operate my Canon with my eyes closed so this comparison was a bit unfair in that I am still getting use to the Olympus layout. However, I did not find anything that gave advantage to one system or another to me. I could work with either. I did the like the balance of the Canon a bit more primarily because of the battery grip. If I keep the E-5, I will definitely add a grip to it as well. It not only helps with the balance between body and lens, but makes vertical shooting much easier.

Workflow

The only difference in workflow had to do with Adobe's refusal to add Olympus to their lens correction in Lightroom. I have PTlens as an editor so I simply used that. This adds a few seconds to the process but nothing major. The amount of post-processing I used for both systems was minor and just involved some minor tweaking if any.

Image Stabilization

The in-body IS of Olympus on the E-5 is terrific. I found it to be much better than the E-620 and every bit as good if not better than the in-lens IS of Canon.

Matching the Settings

One of the things I noticed quite often in identical shooting situations was that the Olympus could use a lower ISO setting with a given lens length, aperture, and shutter speed setting. Many times, I was using ISO 200 on the Olympus and ISO 400 on the Canon to achieve the same setting. In these setting, and again I was pixel peeping, there was definitely less noise in the Olympus shots. This was probably the most dramatic difference I saw between the two systems. This is probably related to the exposure difference I noticed.

OVERALL

Unless I made an operator error, both systems provided excellent image results that without side-by-side comparison would be more than adequate for what I look for in my output.

I am a bit frustrated because I cannot afford to keep both systems. The overall experience I had with this totally subjective testing was that I sort of prefer the Olympus system. After looking at several hundred comparative pictures for the past several days, I can only say that when I did have a preference in the full computer screen comparisons, it was almost always the Olympus picture. I am going to continue shooting with both an eventually make a choice. The great thing, in my mind, is that I can’t make a wrong decision.

I have never used the E-3 or E-30, but I will say that there is a very noticeable difference between the E-620 and the E-5 (and the E-620 is an excellent tool!). If you have an investment in Olympus lenses, I would strongly recommend the E-5. It always looks tempting to llok the other side but sometimes there is no place like home !

It's always nice to get some favourable reviews of any camera under consideration for buying. In my case, it makes me feel more confident with the system I'm using because the critics (of Olympus) can sow seeds of doubt, but the saying of "the grass is always greener in the other paddock" can motivate us to try another system, & maybe making rash decisions in buying & selling only to discover it may not be as perfect as hoped for (in other aspects), though no matter which way a person chooses today, we are spoilt with fantastic results from most new cameras etc. with the ever improving technologies from each manufacturer. The guy above likes to check other systems from his Canon gear & this is why he is now facing a choice between it & Olympus. At least we benefit from his findings.

Cheers,