It seems like such a simple thing now, but it took Olympus three revisions to finally get its "Pen" Micro Four Thirds series down below (or even close to) the magical $600 mark. Lucky for us, the
E-PL1 doesn't skimp on functionality, and in fact expands on the capabilities of the E-P1 and E-P2 with an integrated pop-up flash. We already
rounded up some reviews from the big boys, so check out those in-depth walkthroughs if you're looking to get nerdy, but if you'd still like to hear our thoughts on this new shooter, follow along in our mini-review after the break.
Intro
First off, E-P2 buyers might be feeling a little silly now, at least if all they were looking for was a big-sensored point and shoot. Sure, the E-P2 packs more "professional" details, like dials for shuffling through manual settings, and a few advantages on the imaging front like better image stabilization and faster max shutter speed / higher ISO, but for about half the price the E-PL1 offers the same sensor and most of the same capabilities of its big brother. Even the electronic viewfinder that comes standard for the E-P2 as a hot shoe accessory slots into the E-PL1 just fine, and the addition of a flash adds insult to injury. For people who know their way around aperture and shutter speeds, and rely on those manual controls to make the camera do what they want, there's still plenty to love about the E-P2, but for folks that just want something easy to use which turns out good pictures more often than not, E-PL1 seems to be just what they were waiting for.
Hardware
Aesthetically the camera takes a hit in comparison to the E-P1 and E-P2, with looks and build quality more in line with its price. We'd say for the most part the build feels on par with a budget or mid-tier DSLR, but the buttons on the back feel positively cut-rate, and the plastic 14-42mm kit lens is almost unsettling -- though certainly not as terrible as the sort of stuff manufacturers are putting on those cheap-as-dirt super zoomers these days. The slightly smaller 2.7-inch LCD is the same resolution as the E-P1 and E-P2's, but when you don't have an optical viewfinder, every fraction of an inch counts. The bottom door for the SDHC card and battery is solid, and the rubber flap on the side to expose USB and HDMI plugs isn't going anywhere.
Performance
This is where the camera really shines. Again, in exchange for convenient, physical manual controls the camera offers some high-end imaging at a below-DSLR price. Luckily for us, Olympus has actually done a pretty good job at its consumer-friendly controls in one of those "you're dumb, let us make the picture pretty for you" sort of ways. This is most evident in iAUTO mode. Instead of selecting scene types, the camera presents an almost Photoshop-style set of manually controlled slider settings. The thing is, the sliders aren't working some sort of post-processing magic, but are instead just novel terms or groupings of traditional photographic controls like ISO, shutter speed, and aperture -- without resorting to saying those scary words. For instance, "blur background" lets the user bump their bokeh (out of focus parts of an image created by a shallow depth of field) without knowing that it's actually the aperture size that's doing it. Similarly, "brightness" seems to tweak ISO, but Olympus manages to even throw in individual tweaks to highlights and shadows if you want to dive deeper. Probably our favorite option is the simple "color image," which lets you set white balance with a dirt simple warm-to-cool slider, taking the guessing game out of choosing an appropriate mode for the lighting conditions. Unfortunately you can't mix and match iAUTO settings, so you'd better get what you want out of that particular slider.
The other big downfall of iAUTO is that it has no bearing on the flash -- you'll have to leave things up to the whims of the camera's automatic settings, or go manual to tweak things when blasting the flash. At least there are a number of varieties of flash types to choose from in the menus, and it does a decent job of blowing out a scene, as long as that's what you're looking for.
Another thing that might seem like a gimmick is the "art" filters, and while they're much more gimmicky than iAUTO, the inclusion of a faked tilt-shift "diorama" mode is pretty great -- particularly due to the fact that it even works in video mode, creating a nice time lapse effect.
Speaking of video, let's speak of video. We're pretty happy with what we see here. These Micro Four Thirds cameras are turning out to be some of the best ways of capturing video on the cheap known to man, and the E-PL1 turns around quality 720p footage on a budget. The biggest drawback, as pointed out elsewhere, is the audible auto focus noise made by the camera, which has dogged it since the E-P1, and is perhaps accentuated here by the plastic build of the camera and kit lens. Still, it's not so bad as to be annoying for a vacation video or other casual use, and anyone who's so concerned about audio as to make or break their production probably wouldn't want to be relying on the noisy, mono mic inside the E-PL1 anyway. Luckily there's that hot shoe for adding an external mic, though we'd really like it if Olympus just broke down and built a 3/4-inch jack standard into this thing. We like the image quality, speed of autofocus, and convenient recording of the E-PL1 to be too hung up on this, but it's still a bit of an issue despite Olympus' protestations otherwise.
Video walkthrough
Image quality
Not much use for words here, check out our examples below. The biggest foibles we saw were some telltale glow on bright edges and high noise on the higher ISO shots.
Full crop. Left to right: ISO 1600, ISO 800, ISO 200
ISO 1000, blow-up shows off the edge glow.Video samples
Wrap-up
Overall? We just love the results. You can gripe about manual controls all you want, but at the end of the day the E-PL1 has well-exposed, intuitive controls for making great photos with natural and artificial light, and its video mode is equal parts high quality visuals and dirt-simple controls. After standing up to the test of the CTIA show for our main video rig (even doing the honors of the
EVO 4G hands-on), and sometimes pulling off a better shot indoors than we can coax out of our relatively complicated D90, we wouldn't have any problem adding the E-PL1 to our regular gear list. It's not for everyone, and pro photographers should steer clear, but it's probably for
more people than any other Micro Four Thirds we've played with yet.
posted April 1st 2010 2:28PM
Looks like a great camera, i love the chunky retro feel of it :D
@Lord Vader
It smells pretty good too.
@Nitesh I'd like to add that it's not a good idea to try taste it.
I bow to you, man who can feel through pictures
Do want.
I just used this camera over the weekend and I fooled with the indoor flash on a lot of different settings. It seemed very, very weak and underpowered. I don't know if I have a defective unit or if this flash isn't such a blessing and improvement over the models that don't have a flash. No complaints about the non-flash stuff and the video is pretty nice.
@feinbergfl
There are different setting to reduce the flash intensity. (this might be what you are experiencing) I bought this, and have had one since they went on sale at the beginning of last month. Mine is extremely bright when on full intensity, but the next step down is 1/4 intensity, which is exactly what it implies (Not very bright at all).
Well the flash only has a Guide number of 7 @ISO100. Compare that to the GN12-14 you would typically find in an entry level dSLR. But it's the best could possibly get in a camera this size (the flash's capacitor is bulky).
I wish this Camera had come out a year ago when I opted for a Nikon D60. The first Pen was barely to market and was too expensive for my budget anyway. But at $600, I would have bought this instead.
I Got mine a week ago and I think it's awesome for the price!
This review is littered with errors. Please correct the following:
Second paragraph:
"For people who know their way around aperture and shutter speeds, and rely on those manual controls to make the camera do what they want, there's still plenty to love about the E-PL2"
I'm sure you mean E-P1, since there isn't an E-PL2 camera (for now, at least).
Third paragraph:
"Aesthetically the camera takes a hit in comparison to the E-PL1 and E-PL2"
I'm sure that you mean E-P1 and E-P2 here; after you can't really compare a camera against itself (or imaginary cameras for that matter).
Honestly, I love Engadget, but over the last month or so, there seems to be an increasing number of small, but sloppy errors across reviews (and some large ones too, like in a couple of Joanna's recent reviews). Raise the standards guys.
As for the camera itself; it looks like a useful piece of kit - would like to go and try one out in person to see how it feels in the hand and get a better sense of the size of it before considering a purchase.
@meeku Also, you mention in the article having linked reviews in the past.
That's entirely incorrect. You've linked PREVIEWS in the past, not full reviews.
I wonder who lives next to Paul
I didn't know you could 'fake' tilt-shift video! That's a neat little trick. I wish I could do that on my LX-3...
How does it stack up against the GF1?
i wanna buy it... but its too ugly
I get it. April Fools! Yes, that was a good one.
A few indoor low light shots with the ISO cranked up and down would've been nice.
So, the VF-2 is OUT on E-P1? a shame :( I'd have wanted one...
if you could note whether the sample shots were raw or cams jpeg conversion.
I just picked up the GF1 yesterday. Gotta say that these four thirds cameras are what I've been wanting for a long time now. A lot of people mention that for the price they would pick up a normal DSLR. It misses the whole point, which is the size. It's easy to take these any place. Not to mention when you whip it out you don't attract attention like a SLR.
"Luckily there's that hot shoe for adding an external mic, though we'd really like it if Olympus just broke down and built a 3/4-inch jack standard into this thing."
3/4" jack? Sorry boys, doesn't exist. Maybe you meant 1/4"?
Or if the 3/4" jack did exist, that'd be one heck of a giant hole to put in a camera thats barely bigger than your run-of-the-mill point-and-shoots, with more crammed electronics. For that matter, so would a 1/4" jack. 3.5mm or 2.5mm, maybe.
@Ztringz it is a 2.5mm
They should have made this to begin with, so maybe EP1 owners wouldn't feel duped [swindled] right about now. Personally, I love my EP1, but I'll never buy another Olympus. They have no concept of product continuity, and no concept of what makes nikon and canon the best....which is why they are not.
A camera like this (and the EP1) are cute compacts that are leagues better than point and shooters in terms of image quality and the flexibility of interchangeable lenses (maybe, if they ever get more than 3). But don't trash your DSLR, or decide against a DSLR if you're in the market for one, in favor of a camera like this, you'll regret it.
I don't like the idea of these controls that don't really tell you what's going on, you'll never learn how to really use a camera that way. "Make background blurry?" Really? Like depth of field and bokeh are such difficult concepts?
@MrSmartyPants
What's wrong with a camera that provides scene and art filters as well as fully manual controls?
Perhaps you would also have words with the P/Play in the PASM dial, and perhaps believe this dial should not exist at all, as all one requires is M?
@paultakeda
1. My problem--and note that I clearly state that it's what I don't like, not you or anybody else--is that the manual controls are buried in favor of these fake controls, and in my view it encourages laziness.
2. If you like this style of camera, go for it. Unlike you, I make no judgments about what would work for other people.
3. Perhaps you should not presume what other people want in a camera. You don't know me or my photography, so take the snarky remark at the end of your post and shove it up your aperture.
@MrSmartyPants
Your problem is that you are commenting on a camera class you clearly would never like. This type of camera clearly has an audience, and that audience more than likely prioritizes scene and art filters but may on occasion want to use manual controls. There is always the E-P2 for the other type of user, so really, what was the point of your comment?
Some simply want a blurry background without the need to academically understand bokeh and depth of field. Perhaps you should not presume that people want to know why a background is made blurry. While you're at it, you should also not presume that your snarky remark cannot be replied by a snarky remark; it makes it look like you have a thin skin.
No optical viewfinder = no sale.
It's the only thing that makes these new cameras unusable for me.
@fmian You're never going to be able to get a camera this size with an optical viewfinder. Just stick to SLRs if you really need that feature.
@JRKScope
The Leica Digital Rangefinders have a good optical viewfinder system.
They should use their imaginations and implement something like that.
But yeah, within the budgetary realms of us mere mortals, SLR's are the way to go as far as viewfinders go.
I think I heard that there is an adapter that allows you to use your OM2 lenses with this series of cameras. Has anyone used the adapter? How well does it work? What are the limitations?
@GoFor Technology It works fine, adapts OM lenses to fit this body. Not much else to say. Limitations are no autofocus, but you knew that already since OM's don't autofocus. Also, the adapter is a bit on the pricey side.
"E-P2 buyers might be feeling a little silly now, at least if all they were looking for was a big-sensored point and shoot. Sure, the E-P2 packs more "professional" details, like dials for shuffling through manual settings, and a few advantages on the imaging front like better image stabilization and faster max shutter speed / higher ISO"
That last comment kind of sums up a significant percentage of what differentiates a high end SLR from a mid-range model. IF E-P2 buyers based their purchase solely on the desire to have a big-sensored point and shoot, then they have more money than sense.
You just gotta love those Engadget photo skills... I mean, nothing personal but you can always get somebody who actually knows what he's doing by pressing the shutter release. At least for the Leica's hands-on, for god's sake...
What a gimmick. This one screams "wannabe". Looks cheaply made and made without any pride in China. The E-P1 seems much better.
Yup just bought this camera, it produce outstanding picture quality, I like the art filter it save me a lot of time, I no need edit using any software