Now that Olympus has sold its camera division, people are either going to start selling them or buying them for cheap. Just bought one as a travel lens for next year.
Next cheapest locally is $600+ - https://staticice.com.au/cgi-bin/search.cgi?q=olympus+14-150…. Links were all old.
E-PL8 is $298 as well on clearance - https://www.harveynorman.com.au/olympus-pen-e-pl8-mirrorless…
No idea sadly. Digidirect is continuing their sale with Olympus at 15%,but even this lens is still priced at $636.
nothing discounted yet on the pro line up. still a 100% markup on the 12-40mm (700 at digidirect and about $1400 in some stores).
This is a damn good price especially with weather sealing. Don't think I'll pull the trigger. Already have the 14-42 and 40-150 and they don't sell well on the 2nd hand market :(
Any idea why the 12-40mm has doubled in price? Thankfully I bought mine last year for $700 from CameraPro.
I was shocked to see the price double in such a short amount of time. It makes no sense at all. I sent them an email asking what the reason for it was but I never got a reply.
AUD is crap, and low supply but this didn't affect the f/1.8 trinity, nor macro lenses.. only pro lenses so my belief for the price rise is below.
they released 14-45mm f/4 at 1k in 2020 so given the 12-40mm f/2.8 is much older, but built like tank they raised the price to just the newer model at 1k…
Sad I missed out last year at ~700. I was gonna buy it in April to get TRS….
AUD is crap, and low supply
True but not the reason for the Pro to be higher price. Olympus increased PRO line lenses prices back in February (i think) globally.
@snvl: i guess it was to allow the new F4 trinity to be better prices and be the new affordable lens
Dumb question, but will this lens work with other cameras like Sony or Fuji?
no
Thanks!
It will actually also work with the Panasonic range of micro four third systems.
Only a handful of m4/3 mount system like Olympus and Panasonic
The mother of pro photo/video drones, DJI Inspire, uses M4/3 lenses.
not directly but maybe with an adapter of some sort?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoHbHeN_5dc
I think it is possible to put it on the fuji X mount using this:
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1349600-REG/vello_la_…
No, those are for Olympus' old OM system lenses. Micro Four Thirds system has a smaller image sensor, so lenses would be designed with that in mind and therefore probably not even filling the whole sensor on another system.
is this better than canon 18-200?
Yes
thanks
will oly cameras and lens be continued by the new owners?
no one knows for sure.
Thanks for the heads up that Olympus has agreed to sell its imaging business. Missed that news. Catching up on DPReview now:
https://www.dpreview.com/news/6607157941/olympus-in-agreemen…
I wonder what this means for m43 and Panasonic's support for the platform in the long run, especially since they've got their full frame mirrorless line up?
I've already had Nikon pull the plug on the Nikon 1 line up and my back up system to move to was m43. Would hate to have it die off too. In saying that, I might get the 14-150mm still. Since my Nikon 1 10-100mm died, I need a new superzoom lens.
camera/lenses will be amazing. My main concern is the eventual/potential death of firmware update
I wonder what this means for m43 and Panasonic's support for the platform in the long run,
The next 12 - 18 months are going to be very revealing for the camera industry, and Olympus might not be the only casualty unfortunately.
Who else is on the chopping block? Ricoh, nikon and..??
I have no brand specifically in mind, but the photography market was already contracting before COVID and it's only going to accelerate now. It might not be entire imaging divisions being shuttered (no pun intended) but some lines might be EOL'd, R&D scaled back etc.
I'm surprised though not shocked that it's come to this with Olympus - I knew they were struggling, but they have solid products and excellent tech, so that it's still come to this is a concern.
Thom Hogan always has some thoughtful insights into the photography industry - if you've never read any of his stuff it's worth checking out.
Sold all my Olympus gear earlier in the year
Olympus has fallen
I think that lenses are still safe as you have Panasonic still making bodies, for now… So if places do a clearance on Olympus lenses and you're a Pana user, good time to buy up, Olympus lenses honestly are quite amazing for their size and also some of them the pricing point was great to begin with.
Sad times that even Olympus has buckled, but honestly they kind of did it to themselves in my opinion, ever since the first E-M5 came out, they stole the show I felt, it was at a Beginner to Medium range market and if you scored it on discount it was quite a nice camera to have, but ever since then the subsequent updates to it and EM-10 was just so lacking as their dependency on Sony for sensors were probably limiting themselves.
I also felt that their strategy for chasing the up market and pro's were probably a bad idea as there were other players out there already, they should have stuck to the amateur and medium market and just focused on better improvements. Oh well, different times ahead.
Agree about them stupidly chasing the pro market with the m43 format… if they want a slice of pro, they need to develop a full frame system or partner with one of the other full frame formats.
m43 is great for the amateur and medium market.
Yeah this, I know people keep saying it's not about the full frame only, well yes and no, their high end product EM1-X had a lot of technology but no matter how much tech they packed in it the sensor just put them behind. If people are paying that much money they probably would expect ISO3200 or more wouldn't look like a a fuzzy screen, but I just think it was probably something they couldn't push past because of the sensor.
The thing is, though… the sensor is still just fine for large prints. And the glass was top-notch for the money.
I've got a full-frame SLR and an Olympus E-M5, and honestly, I can't tell which photo came from which unless I crop excessively or look at the EXIF data. And the fast primes on the Olympus are just as good as lenses costing four times the price for the SLR.
It's a shame Olympus failed so spectacularly from a business perspective. The cameras were just fine. I'll grab my Olympus over my Canon for a day-trip every time.
@[Deactivated]: Agree that the sensor is still fine for large prints. I remember blowing up some 8MP shots taken on my Canon 350D from my Africa trip and the results were great. Any modern Olympus camera body would run laps around the 350D so I'd expect 16 or 20 MP shots from m43 to be absolutely fine.
But I think when people are paying that kind of money for pro gear, they want the option to crop and still blow up the cropped images. Being just an enthusiast, this ultimately would be why I would jump up to FF or a pro camera.
completely agree that the chase for high end market and pro users were very out of touch - leaving all the enthusiast cameras models lacking in any R&D or substantial upgrades.
I'm in the enthusiast camp and yeah, I really have been left wanting more for a while. I bought into m43 in 2018 when Nikon 1 was discontinued. m43 had the benefit of having a lot more fast primes… something N1 had very few of. But N1 had an amazing continuous autofocus system that's still better than any Olympus offering. In saying that, I'd have loved for the AF system that eventually made its way into the EM-5 mk3 to be put in the EM-10 series… the latter has a smaller form factor that works better for travel for me (why I liked the N1 bodies!).
I'm guessing I'm just going to have to start buying Panasonic m43 bodies from now on. The G85 has pretty good continuous AF from the reviews I've read so I might just need to look out for a clearance one if there's still stock around.
I waited for 4 years for the Em5 mark 3, I was so severely disappointed with the lack of innovation or upgrades. I guess I know why now.
I'm genuinely sad. my family has been using Olympus cameras for 3 generations now. :(
Fantastic lens, especially at that price. Very light and compact for a lens with 300mm reach, and weatherproof with the right body
I had an old 70-300mm for a Canon EOS500D but now have an Olympus EM-10 Mkiii. Dumb question but is this equivalent focal range is it with the 150mm? :)
Nope - the crop factor on your 550D was 1.6x, so your 70-300 had equivalent Field Of View as a 112-480mm on Full Frame.
The Oly listed above with crop factor of 2x is the equivalent FOV of 28-300mm on Full Frame.
Ok thank you. So that means I won't be getting nearly as much of a zoom range on the Olympus lens than I did on the old Canon :(
@adrianhughes1998: Not with this lens but if you get the Olympus 70-300mm lens, you will end up with an equivalent range of 140-600mm with your olympus camera compared to your old canon.
I'm pretty sure the E-PL8 is the last of the PEN lite series to allow an external viewfinder attached, the E-PL9/10 is flash only.
The menus were so incredibly complex on my em10, but the stabilisation and the interesting features like live composite were really cool.
I also think they should have chased the amateur market much harder. Due to the size of the sensors they were never going to compete with full frame cameras, or even Sony and Fuji with their f/1.4 primes. The size/cost/IQ ratio just didn't make sense unfortunately.
Time to get out of m4/3.
Why? They're still perfectly good cameras, and they're not going to suddenly stop working once the company is sold. When they start clearing them out they'll be good value, and Panasonic seems to be persisting with the format.
Used market on m43 gear will take a hit
Actually tony northrup did a bit on this.
Assuming its a system people still wants to be in, and assuming the m4/3 system died entirel (which isn't the case at the moment) they've found that the 2nd hand market actually increased in price due to lack of "new" stock and only option is 2nd hand market.
@lawyerz: Yeah, I saw that. I got my EM10ii for just under $500 so $600 for the EM5ii is pretty good.
I was considering the EM5 mk3 though simply because of the better AF. Though, I'd probably just move to a Panasonic G85/G95 for even better AF at that point. I like the look retro look of the OMD cameras but unless I was buying a spare body for under $400, I'd prefer to pay more for the better AF.
@Mugsy: I have the EM1 Mark 2 - which is the same AF as the EM5 Mark 3. Honestly unless you're doing low light shooting or sports/fast pace, the difference is fairly small. Yes it locks on faster and more accurately, but in good thing the difference is tiny.
@lawyerz: Yeah, fast pace shooting is the issue. When on holidays, I tend to take a lot of photos when moving (i.e. when I'm looking out of a coach, train, boat, etc). My Nikon V1 plus 10-100mm was amazing in that situation… I had the zoom range and the camera just predicted and tracked objects so well in auto mode. One time I was on a high speed boat going around the southern end of Tassie and that combo got shots of dolphins leaping out of the water for me. The most affordable m43 body with AF that seems that dependable is the Panasonic G85/95.
@lawyerz: Hope so, i still have a em5 original, pany 20mm and oly 40mm that has seen very little use over the past 2 years
Get this lens and this OMD-EM5 mk II on sale, you will have a light-weight all purpose set up for travelling.
This is what I am considerring.
My canon 18-200IS is very disappointing at telescope end. What I expect is a long zoom with IQ at 18-135IS level.
Altertively I am thinking of sony rx10.
I wholeheartedly recommend the Em5 Mark 2 as a travel camera. If you're not doing alot of low light shooting, its such a great camera. I'd pair it with a fast prime rather than this camera BUT you'll never need to change lenses with such a wide focal range. The in body stabilisation is absolutely fantastic.
$598 is SUCH a good price. Don't let the age ~5 years put you off, it's a fantastic compact travel set.
It's such a good price I'm even considering getting a spare set.
This is the setup I have (along with a small Panasonic Prime), it's a great little all-round kit.
AF is slow even compared to the older a6000, only has contrast AF which may be a dealbreaker for many.
Body is not smaller nor lighter than a6000 either. only benefit I can think of is IBIS which Sony lacks.
Depending on the lens, AF is pretty quick. I've used the advertised lens to shoot RAAF jets flying over.
@dav3: Pretty quick is and relative and subjective. PDAF only exists on Oly's flagship models (EM1, X1) which says a lot.
@OzHan: …. and for 99% of general use AF speed will be fine. Your A6000 also lacks weatherproofing, which I'd say would be more beneficial to most people than lightning fast AF.
@dav3: Weatherproofing is not very high in my priority list when it comes to cameras. If i ever need it (very rarely) I'd use plastics to cover the camera.
AF is definitely one of the most important aspects of a camera. I'd upgrade my camera for the improvement on AF alone. of course your needs might be different from mine.
I have the EM-10 original, and bought this lens.
So guess I will be have to now sell off my 40-150 and 14-42 kit lenses in the meantime.
I noticed they have the EM-5 Mkii for $598 which looks like a pretty good price - wondering if the upgrade woulld be worthwhile, or should I wait for a deal on the mkiii?
For $1K difference, you'd be better going for mkii. It will take you a long time to outgrow the capabilities of the mkii. If you get mkiii, you'd need even more $ to get the pro lenses to take full advantage.
Thanks - is $598 that much of a deal for it though?
edit: I got the EM-5 cheers
I have the EM-10 Mark iii already. Wondering if I should get this em-5 mkii as well 🤔
The EM10 mkiii is a great camera though.
I'm still wrestling with my purchase now - the EM10 original has been great for me and such a bargain too - for me the weather sealing to go with this lens, full screen articulation, mic input and HDMI streaming were what pushed me to the buy button.
I now have to sell my EM-10 14-42, 40-150 and the Yi M1 to make room for this…. ahh, the photographic circle of life.
@[Deactivated]: It is but weather sealing is handy in the Em-5 for sure. Everything else appears to be better on the em-10 mk iii though. Tough decisions cos weather sealing could be handy.
Haha I know the feeling but why not keep the stock pancake 14-42 lens and the 40-150. I have the 14-42 stock and the 45mm f1.8 for my existing kit
e-m5 mkii is an amazing camera, I had one for months
weather sealing, abundance of controls, snappy performance, this is way better than e-m10
however I still sold all my Olympus gear not 2 weeks ago because lack of pdaf was getting to me, and instead of investing into e-m1 I decided to switch brands
@shabaka: Can certainly understand, If you're used to the performance of PDAF you will never want to go back to the slow CAF. It's a deal breaker for me even though their lenses can be appealing.
@OzHan: used to be a Canon shooter (entry level then 6D, 6D mii), then got fed up by the size and weight of the equipment and sold it all
after that been through Sony and Olympus, each system has its pros and cons but now I am back to Canon (mirrorless M5 this time, with dual pixel PDAF on sensor) after full circle
Canon colors are the best, at least in my eyes. I miss speed of Sony and controls of Olympus, but when I get to post-production man, Canon colors are the best
@shabaka: Hello Tony Northrup lol. Today I traded in all my MFT gear towards an x-t4. Such a sad day for me but at least I won't have much trouble when I need to sell the Fuji (for the moment)
@chartparker: x-t4 is an amazing camera, I like how Fuji work with colour, most of the time it's relatively easy to skip post production and just get great results out of the camera
and now with IBIS it's even more amazing
but one thing that I don't like is lenses are way too expensive on Fuji.
I handled x-t3 and decided that I still prefer Canon. also, cheap lenses. with ef-s adapter that I have I can put any Canon lens on my M5 and it will work and focus right. so Canon just works for me lol
yeah well done, mate, I sold my MFT 2 weeks ago, last lens sold today.
the em5 is a considerable upgrade over the em10 in my opinion. It's older, but it packs more feature set and doesn't feature dumbed down menu and options. Plus weathersealing.
at clearance for $598 at Harvey Norman - https://www.harveynorman.com.au/olympus-om-d-e-m5-mkii-mirro…
I'd say go for it!
I would skip on the em5 mark 3 on barely any improvement other than the AF, plastic body, smaller battery, plus a huge price difference.
@lawyerz: Yeah I got burnt hard on the em5iii. Decent camera but not for that price. Trade in value was next to nothing too, but considering how much I got for everything else it balanced out.
Easier than trying to sell my stuff when everyone else is probably trying to offload theirs
@chartparker: EM5 III is still a very capable camera that'll serve you well for years. It may not have been worth the launch price tag, but if you already own it, just continue to enjoy the shots!
I don't get why people want to immediately offload their cameras that was perfectly fine 2 days ago. Cameras will continue to work as well as they've normally have. I understand not buying MORE into the system, or first-time users getting into photography, but people who already own it will continue to just.. well, work.
@lawyerz: I already got rid of it. To be honest I had been eyeing off the x-t4 since it was announced. This just pushed me over the edge
@chartparker: sweet! I do love the Fuji's look as well, and it was a fairly close call between the Fuji and Olympus systems many years ago but ultimately picked Olympus for their in body stabilisation!
Well maybe if the patents for their fantastic IBIS gets sold, may it please go to Fuji!
@lawyerz: One can only hope! Olympus had a lot going for them but they just kept recycling sensors and intentionally gimping their lines.
The x-t4 was everything I wanted in the em5iii except a bit bigger. Hopefully the size difference won't annoy me too much, but since my child was born I've only ever used 2 of my almost 9 lenses so it'll hopefully balance out by carrying less lenses around
@lawyerz: I sold my e-m5 mii 2 weeks ago because I was hitting the limits of the sensor too often, also contrast auto focus is really driving me nuts.
@lawyerz: Haven’t got it yet - waiting for the lens to come in. I have this pang of dread in the pit of my stomach about whether I’ve made the right choice or not =/
Maybe I should’ve just stuck with what I had… :’(
@lawyerz: it's the other fella who got x-t4, I wouldn't spend lots of money now
I got a used Canon M5 with 18-150 lens instead, also 22 F2 pancake. they do everything I want (obviously I don't give a damn about 4k video, I just love Canon colours)
@shabaka: M5 with superzoom 18-150 cost me $750, and 22/2 pancake $160. camera came with ef-s to ef-m adapter so I can just stick 50/1.8 stm on it ($100 on used market) and rejoice.
I got more from selling e-m5 mii and 3 Olympus lenses so I haven't spent a dollar on this exchange.
Granted the EM10 mk iii can do 4k video and the EM5 only 1080p, a photography enthusiast would appreciate the EM5 mk ii more than just weather sealing because:
The E-M5 II has a faster maximum speed of 1/8000s with the mechanical shutter whereas the E-M10 III stops at 1/4000s.
The E-M5 II does better for continuous shooting: it can go as fast as 10fps in High mode and 5fps in Low mode with continuous AF. The E-M10 III does 8.6fps and 4.5fps respectively and has slightly better buffer capabilities as a result (22 vs 16 RAW frames).
Furthermore, the E-M5 mark II is compatible with Dual IS and select Olympus lenses. It allows you to take advantage of both sensor and optical stabilisation at the same time, which improves the performance even more.
And this - The E-M5 II takes advantage of the sensor shift technology to increase the native resolution of its sensor. It does this by taking 8 shots in rapid succession and moving the sensor by half a pixel in between each shot. The images are then merged to create a 40MP (JPG) or 70MP (RAW) image.
1/8000 shutter is the same as 1/4000 on Sony as its lowest ISO is 200.
6 year old a6000 is capable of 11 fps with much faster AF.
so nice of Olympus to sell their camera business 2 weeks after I sold my Olympus camera and lenses.
this is a very good lens though. weather sealing and good optics. fantastic deal for someone
Looking forward to more deals on lenses for my Olympus camera.
I like the M.ZUIKO PREMIUM range.
Hey guys, sorry for dumb question. What could this lens be good for? It's just I bought M-10 during last sale and still did not get round to properly using it. All the pictures that I take are so much inferior to my Pixel 3 that it actually puts me off using the camera at all. No HDR, no night mode, too much time to focus, too long to fiddle… The only advantage I actually could see is good flash when taking photos inside. Even portraits that I tried to do with M-10 do not look that fancy at all and require a lot of work with Photoshop… So, I guess my question is what am I doing wrong and if the lens is going to help me?
I only take pictures of people, not artsy stuff but something like: been there, done that.
this is a very good walk around lens which is good enough for everything really, with tradeoffs like any other superzoom
it's a shame that you have em-10 because it's not weatherproof - this lens is. with this lens you'd be able to shoot in light rain, let's say for example
otherwise it allows you to have 1 lens and do everything you need. get a wide angle for landscape or interiors (although on MFT 14 isn't too wide) and get some portraits of any kind (head and shoulders or half body or full body your choice), get photos of whole building or some details - it gives you versatility. if you want to travel and pack 1 lens that would be it.
will this lens help? it could, depends on what you're shooting right now.
make sure your camera is set up correctly, I hate settings that Olympus has on its cameras out of the box. too much sharpening, silly functions assigned to buttons etc. I had a guide somewhere hang on..
https://www.wrotniak.net/photo/m43/em1.2-sett.html
it is specifically for em-1 mark ii but lots of that long read is applicable to the rest of modern Olympus models.
Thank you for detailed answer. Will give it a try:)
Apples and oranges. Images from smartphones look great, especially low light stuff (which this lens will struggle with) but there's plenty these cameras will do that your phone can't, like in this case shooting at up to 300mm.
If you just want to take happy snaps of people and are happy with your phone then by all means stick to it, especially since it's not an extra thing you have to carry around. If you want to learn about photography then muck around with your E-M10, once you know what you're doing you can get some really good results.
Your question explains why the camera marketing is shrinking, many people simply do not have a need for dedicated cameras. smart phones are all they need and in many cases are a better choice.
JB price matched the EM-5 mkii body for $598
Just received a refund from Harvey Norman. OOS?
Thanks, picked up at lunch from Nunawading.
Anyone have a screenshot of website I can use for price match elsewhere? It’s sold out at HN
Wow that's a great price!
Any ideas of other shops that are clearing Olympus lenses?
I'm after a pro lens