Equipment New gear advice needed

They offer no affordable fast primes and they offer no affordable fast zooms. The majority of their great lenses are extremely expensive. The majority of their lenses are also variable aperture. If Oly offered cameras with good high ISO performance to make up for this then it would help their cause, but they don't. I have no doubt they make lenses that perform well, but they do so with limitations--be it high cost or slow apertures. As I've said repeatedly in this thread they do not offer nearly as many options as Canon or Nikon--which is important to a lot of people.

 

Indeed the Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 12-60mm F2.8-4.0 SWD is quite simply a superb lens, which can lay claim to being one of the very best standard zooms currently available. This is a design which would have been almost unimaginable even five years ago; a 5x wideangle to telephoto zoom which, though the use of some exotic optics, manages to perform almost flawlessly across its entire range, and throws in some impressive macro performance too. The relatively fast maximum aperture (a half to a full stop faster than APS-C equivalents such as the Sony Carl Zeiss 16-80mm F3.5-4.5 or Nikon 16-85mm F:3.5-5.6 VR), coupled with the excellent wide-open performance, also allows the use of lower ISOs at equivalent light levels for maximum image quality.

From DP Review. That is a £700 is zoom it seems.

Certainly in terms of the studio results, it's the nearest we've yet found to a technically perfect lens

The greatest strength of the Four Thirds system undoubtedly lies in the optics, and the 50mm F2.0 macro ranks alongside the likes of the Zuiko Digital ED 12-60mm F2.8-4.0 SWD as one of the finest lenses of its type currently available from any manufacturer.

From DP Review regarding the 50mm F/2 Macro, which I see can be had on Ebay new for £370.

Good high ISO performance and lots of control over noise reduction

Dp review of EPL-1 which is one of those compact micro 4/3 cameras.

Now as mentioned, I don't know anything about cameras, but I can go on the net and read up about it and nothing Vers is spouting seems to hold any weight on actual reputable review sites, but the forums attached to DPReview seem to be similarly full of people with beef against Olympus and its users, which seems to boil down to 'my camera is better than yours' even if I do look like Richard Simmons.

No offence to anyone, as I do look like him too.

 

It seems, yet again, that we've drifted a bit. Let's try and stick to the OhPees original question.

The D700/300/5D/7D question has a lot of subtleties to it, there is plenty to work with.


And yes, I know, I have been guilty of it too.

 

FANBOI HYPOCRITE!!!

 

You're taking everything I've said out of context by offering a few examples found on DPR, of all places. As I've said, and I'll continue to say, the Oly system is a less complete system than the Canon and Nikon systems. It doesn't perform as well as a whole and it doesn't offer near as many options. That is my point. You can search the internet and pull a select few quotes in favor of a few Oly products, which may or may not be true, but that says very little about the system as a whole compared to others like Canon or Nikon. This is simply a case of 'it is what it is'.

 

I LOL'd. No, really, I did.

 

Well you are hardly going to think anything of DP Reviews if they publish stuff you disagree with are you.

Dunno about the OP but I am going with Nikon, as there is more solid future for the format than 4/3, even though it looks very good.

 

Again, you are choosing to focus on a single, irrelevant portion of my post rather than looking at the larger picture. If you can, please feel free to indulge me by listing important aspects of the Oly system that make it a better choice over the Canon or Nikon system. Then do yourself a favor and flip the coin, looking at what the Canon/Nikon systems offer over the Oly system. I think you would see things a bit different after doing so. And just so we're clear, this discussion has everything to do with being a well informed consumer, knowing what each manufacturer has to offer and at what cost they offer it, and nothing to do with fanboy-ism.

 

You're fighting a losing battle here. You have your opinions now accept that other people have theirs

Olympus have much better glass than most of the crap Canon churn out and a fair amount that Nikon produce as well, that's how they can compete with the larger names

 

It has absolutely nothing to do with opinion...Nikon and Canon offer more. That is a fact.

 

I'll give you one thing Vers, your method of disagreement is certainly adaptable, and you even caved in at one point and admitted that some Oly glass was 'great'.

I bet if we kept this up for another 10 pages, you'd break right down and post pics of your secret Zuiko Stash, maybe with yourself standing by the side in ladies underwear.

Ok. so lets get serious, I think that what Bigsharn is trying to say is it is personal preference, but it is confusing for someone looking to 'buy in' to a system like myself.

Canon and Nikon offering more is surely subjective, depends what you want. You seem to be arguing just for the sake of it, instead of accepting opinions differ.

The company I run holds four patents for Fluidized bed technologies, if there was a forum for it (I don't know, maybe it could be within an Engineering forum), I certainly wouldn't be being as arrogant as you if someone came along and recommended Cyclonic separation was far better as Fluidized beds 'sucked'.

 

You continue to completely miss the point. I do not think Oly makes shitty products, as I've said, they just don't make nearly as many nor do they offer as much. THAT IS THE POINT. Unless you've either got a lot of cash to spend OR you can deal with slower lenses, a slower AF system, and inferior ISO performance then there is no sense in buying into the Oly system. You can either choose to ignore the blatant differences or you can choose to recognize the differences--that's up to you. I seriously implore you to do some research...if you do enough, at the end of the day you'll come to a realization that what I've been saying throughout the thread is actually true and not just the smear campaign you envision it to be.

 

I didn't think anything of the sort. I appreciate your insight, but I was all ready to buy into the Oly genre and your first comments were something like 'Uhggg. What ever you do, don't do that' after Bigsharn said 'get an Olympus'. You might have missed the point but you were essentially being pretty rude and disrespectful.

 

Someone made a suggestion, I then disagreed with that suggestion and offered sound advice in its place with logic to back it up. If that's too tough to take then I don't know what to tell you. I apologize if I hurt anyone's feelings when speaking of camera equipment--I didn't realize it could be such a touchy subject.

 

Ok, this is getting a bit silly. Vers IS right and minotaur and bigsharn are unfair to him. I've been in photography industry for like 12 years now (recent film convert) and shot different cameras starting with Zenit-E when I was a kid. And I can tell you both, go on any good photo retailer's website and you will see that Vers is right. Olympus does NOT offer huge variety of lenses, especially not comparing to dozens of lenses offered by either Canon or Nikon. A quick visit to warehouseexpres.com and you'll see.

No point picking any fight over it - it's a state fact and ask any pro photographer and they'll tell you. Furthermore show me any pro level photographer that uses Oly or Sony (mostly Minolta lenses anyway). They either shoot Canon or Nikon or medium format. I've played with just about every model available when I was working for one of the professional cameras retailers and rentals and again, trend continues. Just to make my point here's a shot of currently available Canon lenses



I mean my math skills are a bit off today, but to my counting there are 65 lenses and 3 converters. Show me please at least a third of that Oly branded and I'll shake your hands, otherwise, could you finally stop ranting and attacking poor Vers and admit that Canon and Nikon collections are bigger and mostly better. Not to say - some of the best lenses ever produced came out of Olympus but their glory is here no more.

 

Apparently there are about 30 4/3 lenses and if you use the Olympus OM adaptor, you can use all the OM ones, of which there are 50 +. Then of course you can use just about any lens you like with an adaptor, manual focus though. In fact, there are people on Youtube showing vids of Zuiko lenses on their Canon's. General concensus is cheap and good.

But, then, if you know so much, why did you make this thread in the first place ?

Anyway, as Bigsharn points out and it seems to hold weight, many Nikon and Canon kit lenses are ****.
Probably some Olympus ones are, I don't know, but that's not the point.

Nevermind 'Poor Vers', if the guy wants to rub people up the wrong way with his flippant style, then he must suffer the consequences, which anyway, I bet he couldn't care less, or as the Yanks say, 'Could care less' whatever that means.

 

??? He listed four bodies, none of which were Oly, and for a reason (he used to shoot with Oly). The reason for the thread was to help the OP decide which would be the best possible route to take given his budget and subject matter.

The rest of your post speaks out of pure ignorance. Do some research--learn a thing or two and then come back and try to have a worthwhile conversation.

 

31 four thirds lenses and 4 adapters. Granted not all Oly branded but hey, it is a fair bit of choice.
Don't get me wrong, I do not deny Canon and Nikon offer more lenses - I just feel people may discount Olympus/Four Thirds too easily at times. And yes, I am aware of and do not deny the disadvantages of the system.

 

Look what Vers said: I needed help with my choices as those will define my photographic future for a very considerable amount of time. As I said, I'm a recent film convert and in digital world things add up a tad differently.

I could give you 10 good reasons why to go with Canon or Nikon instead of 4/3 system, would you like me too, or will you still be ranting of Oly's superiority?

 

Its highly unlikely i'd ever want a decent conversation with someone so bitter. You must be so extremely insecure to be so bitter that someone doesn't share your opinion. Furthermore, I find your attitude towards newcomers to the forum, frankly disgusting. I'm sure you aren't so bold when not hiding behind your computer either. Plus, I'm 50, shame on you for calling an old man ignorant.