Olympus 16.1 Megapixels E-M5 Rugged Mirrorless

Olympus announced the Olympus OM-D (OM Digital) Series of Micro Four Thirds camera. The dust- and splashproof metal-bodied Olympus OM-D (also called the Olympus E-M5) is a retro styled 16.1 Megapixels compact camera featuring a body-integral 5-axis image stabilizer to compensate for multi-directional camera shake during both still photography and HD moviemaking, 1.44-million-dot 120 fps refresh rate EVF and auto focus with 3D subject tracking at up to 9 fps sequential shooting. It also comes with a tilting 3.0-inch touch screen OLED and new Movie Effects: One Shot Echo, for a semi-transparent frame at your whim and Multi Echo, for a multi-motion trail effect.In sequential shooting mode, the camera is capable of capturing up to 9 frames per second (4.2fps with AF, when fitted with the M.Zuiko DIGITAL ED 12-50mm f/3.5-6.3 lens). 

The OM-D has an eye proximity sensor that allows automatic switching between the EVF and the articulated OLED touchscreen. The camera is capable of recording Full HD videos and can store them in either AVI or MOV format with M.JPEG or MPEG-4 encoding. Along with the OM-D camera, Olympus also announced a number of new accessories including the dust- and splashproof MMF-3 four thirds mount adapter, the HLD-6 power battery holder grip and the FL-600R flash with a guide number of 36 (in metres at ISO 100/21°), improved recharge time as well as a wireless control option. The Olympus E-M5 is available in body-only (black and silver) for $999.99, or $1,299.99 with black M.ZUIKO Digital ED 12-50 mm f3.5-6.3 EZ lens, or $1,099.99 with black M.ZUIKO DIGITAL 14-42 mm f3.5-5.6 II R lens.

 Here's the summary of review by DigitalCameraResorucePage:"Performance is absolutely one of the OM-D's strong suits. The camera takes a little over a second before you can take a shot, and then it's off to the races. Olympus has appropriately named their AF system "FAST", and it certainly lives up to the hype. The OM-D focuses faster than any ILC that I've used, whether you're outdoors or in low light. I didn't find shutter lag to be a problem, and shot-to-shot delays were very brief. The OM-D can shoot continuously at a whopping 9 frames/second, slowing down after 15-18 shots (depending on the image quality setting). Battery life on the camera is about 10% below average for high-end ILCs, so I'd recommend picking up a spare battery (and maybe that nice battery grip, too). 

The OM-D produces photos of very good quality. The only real issues I had were exposure-related (and minor, at that) -- the camera tends to underexpose slightly, and it will clip highlights at time (though it's not as bad as previous Micro Four Thirds cameras). Colors were nice and saturated, though there was a bit of a color cast in artificial lighting. Images are slightly soft, probably due to the heavier-than-normal amount of noise reduction being applied here. You can try turning the noise filter down or just increasing the in-camera sharpening to get around this -- or just shoot RAW. The OM-D keeps noise levels down through ISO 3200 in good light, and ISO 1600 in low light. Once you get to those points, you'll want to switch to RAW for noticeably better image quality. Purple fringing levels were relatively low with the lenses I tested. 

Redeye was not an issue with the included external flash.Overall, the Olympus OM-D EM-5 is an excellent Micro Four Thirds camera, assuming that you can survive with the less-than-stellar ergonomics. It produces very good photos and HD movies, performs extremely well, has a large feature set, and has top-notch build quality. Besides the button clutter issue I described above, its other "big" downsides include poor outdoor OLED visibility and focus hunting in movie mode. If you're looking for a premium interchangeable lens camera then I'd definitely recommend the OM-D, but do yourself a favor and see what you think about the ergonomics first."

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