Definitely a great step forward, cleaner break from dysfunctional habitual compacts than Panasonic's G1 (which was specifically tailored to not shock that crowd). Kudos for Olympus !
It is too bad that they were not able to put in a really high performance low light sensor. As it is it's doing a decent job for low light jobs (I would hazard maybe 80% of what a Canon DSLR 20D can do, based on what I have seen so far). But, had they put in say something like the SuperCCD sensor of the 3 year old Fuji F30 (well, upsized to 4/3 with a few more megapixels, but not that much more, say from 6 to 10 or 12) this would have been a runaway success, a must for all professional shooters.
As I already have enough cams to cover most bases I am happy to wait for the E-P2 or maybe E-P3. Some of these upcoming features were hinted at in a recent interview given to French photogs by A. Watanabe, Olympus' point man on the digital Pen. Some salient details, Oly is definitely considering mostly an EVF (electronic viewfinder) although not closing the door on an optical viewfinder (yes, please!) - and the sound system of the P1 is based on their flagship LS10 digital PCM sound recorder. A near complete translation of that Q&A is available there FYI:
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Definitely a great step forward, cleaner break from dysfunctional habitual compacts than Panasonic's G1 (which was specifically tailored to not shock that crowd). Kudos for Olympus !
It is too bad that they were not able to put in a really high performance low light sensor. As it is it's doing a decent job for low light jobs (I would hazard maybe 80% of what a Canon DSLR 20D can do, based on what I have seen so far). But, had they put in say something like the SuperCCD sensor of the 3 year old Fuji F30 (well, upsized to 4/3 with a few more megapixels, but not that much more, say from 6 to 10 or 12) this would have been a runaway success, a must for all professional shooters.
As I already have enough cams to cover most bases I am happy to wait for the E-P2 or maybe E-P3. Some of these upcoming features were hinted at in a recent interview given to French photogs by A. Watanabe, Olympus' point man on the digital Pen. Some salient details, Oly is definitely considering mostly an EVF (electronic viewfinder) although not closing the door on an optical viewfinder (yes, please!) - and the sound system of the P1 is based on their flagship LS10 digital PCM sound recorder.
A near complete translation of that Q&A is available there FYI:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nycandre/3695960422/