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Comment by _0xdd

3 days ago

This is amazing. It's such a shame that Olympus and Panasonic have largely abandoned the small camera market within the M43 system. I really wish another manufacturer would step up and build something similar to the GX85, which is still one of my favorite walkaround cameras.

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_0xdd

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alistairSH  3 days ago

FWIW, Olympus spun-off/sold their consumer camera division. It's now operating as OM System (1) and has released a few new cameras over the past few years. As the article mentioned, the latest is the OM-3, which is sort of similar form factor, but not exactly compact. They also have the smaller Pen EP-7, but it's not available in the US (though they're readily available on Ebay or via KEH etc). I bought an EP-7 for an earlier Xmas gift to myself, but haven't had much change to use it (previously had an EP-5 and E-M5ii).

1 - https://explore.omsystem.com/us/en/

  • hypercube33  2 days ago

    They are no Pentax Q which is ridiculously small and maybe not the best design lens / shutter wise as a lot of the in-lens shutters seem to fail...

  • vladvasiliu  2 days ago

    Meh, I love my Olympus cameras, but I wouldn't call the latest models exactly small. The OM1 is pretty huge, even though it's smaller than the ridiculous Panasonic G9. I think it's close to the Sony a7 line and the canon r6, which are full-frame. Of course, if you're into long lenses, it wipes the floor with them, if the compromise works for you. On the wide end, the advantage isn't as clear-cut, though nobody else has anything comparable to the 8-25.

    What I'm hoping to see is a new penf. When it came out, they somehow managed to cram into that small body almost everything the em1 had at the time. The om3 is pretty small, too, but for some reason they decided to keep the faux-pentaprism bump. It would have been great if it had the viewfinder to the side.

    • alistairSH  2 days ago

      The Pen EP-7 is the same size as the older EP-5. With any of the Olympus prime lenses, it's about as small as you get (ignoring the Pentax Q, which was ridiculously tiny).

      But 100% agree on the OM-1 and OM-3. They're smaller than many APS-C bodies, especially once you add a lens, but they're nowhere near pocketable, not even in a jacket pocket. And I feel like the OM-3 was a bit of a miss - it should have been a "rangefinder" form factor (no pentaprism hump) and a few mm smaller in each dimension. And marketed as a Pen-F. That said, the camera itself seems to be pretty darn good - basically a slightly smaller, vintage-vibe OM-1. Once used examples hit the market, I'll be tempted to buy one.

      My parents both shoot Nikon DSLRs and I chuckle every time they break out their birding lenses (400mm NIKKOR of some sort). It's as big as my forearm and fills half a backpack. My Lumix 100-300 (yeah, not quite apple-to-apple) is minuscule in comparison. [I don't do enough wildlife to bother with a more expensive telephoto).

goochwart  3 days ago

I just bought a GX9 5 years after selling my whole system cause I missed the form factor so much. M43 really is the best compromise between size and image quality imo, with the caveat that I'm not a professional. No other mount lets me casually EDC an 80-300 equivalent lens.

There's Esquisse (https://esquisse.camera/) trying to step up, but it's still in the very early stages.