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Olympus Lenses Overview

Lesson 15 from: Olympus PEN-F Fast Start

John Greengo

Olympus Lenses Overview

Lesson 15 from: Olympus PEN-F Fast Start

John Greengo

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Lesson Info

15. Olympus Lenses Overview

Next Lesson: Shooting Menu 1

Lesson Info

Olympus Lenses Overview

and let's talk a little bit about the lenses themselves. And so one of my favorite lenses is the Olympus to 40 lens. It's got a good general purpose range. It lets in a lot of light. It's just good for a lot of different types of photography, so you'll have a zoom ring. You'll have a focus ring on it. This particular lands has a lens function button that can be program in the menu system of the camera. To do a particular function that you find useful, we have our alignment mark and then on front, and this will vary from lens to lens distancing scales. So if you want to manually focus using the scale, you can use that, or you can let the camera auto focus. There is a hood mount. Each lens has its own dedicated lens hood, and this news is designed for blocking light coming from the sides, which may hit the front or the internal lenses and cause flares or reflections inside. The filter on this hood are in this lenses 62 but it varies according to each lens. There's some many different st...

andard sizes for filters on, and you'll need to check each lens to make sure that you have the right size because they're, as I say, there's a variety of sizes. One of the funky things about this is that you can turn left or right when it comes to focusing to get to infinity, and you can choose in the menu system as to which way you're. Lens will focus in order to reach infinity or close up. And this is important for people coming from Nikon, because Nikon lenses focus the exact opposite of pretty much everyone else's lenses. And so, if you're used to one or the other, you can customize your camera so that it focuses the same as your other camera that you might have previously had. So let's talk about a few of my favorite lenses for this particular camera, so you might end up with one of the more basic zooms. The 14 to 42 is about the smallest one that you'll ever get to. They do make a very compact version of that For people who want something that is incredibly small in size, the to 1 50 is kind of your standard telephoto zoom. If you want the all in one, you would get the 14 to 50 It's a little bit slower in aperture, but it means that you are less likely to need to change lenses. I love the Olympus pro zoom lenses, thes air ones that have faster apertures. These are the 28 lenses, and we have a wide angle, and it's so why they can't even put filters on it. So that's the one little downside to that lens. But it's a very, very high quality optics and very high quality construction on it. The 12 to 40 as I said, is a good general purpose one. And for anyone who likes to do a lot of telephoto work, the 40 to 1 50 is a great range at a very fast aperture. Now these are premium lenses that do come at premium prices will be aware of that. There is also some fantastic primes or individual lenses on this particular system, and so Olympus makes. Just as I said, they've made some very nice small products, and there's these air small lenses that let in a lot of light that are all optically very, very good. And so, if you can find a good reason toe. Get one of these in your camera bag. I highly recommend it. They're just really nice lenses to work with. They've been introducing MAWR and more prime pro lenses out there in the Olympus brand, and they've got some new funky ones that got the fish islands and they have a 300 member. Remember, with the two times crop factor of this sensor, that's the equivalent of a 600 millimeter F four lands. And so, if you're into bird photography, wildlife photography and some sports and action photography, both of these lenses might be kind of fun for that type of action. Now, one of the beauties, of course, with the micro 4/3 system is that you can seamlessly use the Panasonic lenses, and these are fantastic lenses on, and I prefer some of the Panasonic prime lenses on some of them, and actually, all of these examples here. These are Panasonic lenses that were designed with some of the like a characteristics in image quality and construction quality, and they are just really of the highest order. And so, once again, these go back to like those sweet primes I just talked about. You can find a reason for one of these toe. Get him in your bag. Highly recommend there a little bit more money. But they are incredible lenses for what they dio. So that takes us through the menu functions of the camera or excuse me through the camera control functions. We've talked about every button in every control on the camera. So hopefully that will help you figure out how to set the camera. And we're gonna try something new here. We're going to go into questions. And so we do have somebody who has emailed in a question, and we're gonna see if we can put that up on the big screen. And I will see if I can answer your question from Judith Frost. I haven't Olympus Pen Mini E p M. To Will this class help me understand my camera? Well, each cameras a little bit different and where all the controls are on the camera. But a lot of the Olympus cameras, especially the pen cameras, and I bet you there's a bunch of people who have pen cameras. But maybe not this model out there. The outside controls are probably kind of different than just the buttons and where they are, and their labels are a little bit different. But when we get to the menu section the second half of this class, there's a lot of features that are exactly the same. I don't know how many with that particular camera, but I would guess that probably 75 to 80% of the menu items that we talk about are going to be in your camera. And if you have another pen, camera or other Olympus camera, the fact of the matter is, is that the menu system from this camera has been pulled almost directly from the E M five mark, too. And that was based on the E. M. One and that the other pen models that this is something that they share quite uncommon. And so there's a lot of features that are going to be carried forward. And so, yes, this class will help you understand your camera. But just be aware some of the buttons were going to be in a different place. There's gonna be some different capabilities, and generally as we go forward in time, Olympus just keeps adding more and more features and options onto the cameras. So if you have an older camera, you're gonna have similar ones, but not quite as many. So there you go. Thank you very much for your question.

Class Materials

Bonus Materials with Purchase

Olympus PEN-F Recommended Settings
Olympus PEN-F Keynote

Ratings and Reviews

Jay Linsenbigler
 

Awesome course and thorough description of the PEN-F capabilities and functions. HOWEVER, John's "big boy camera" bias comes through when he describes some of the creative functions as "just fun". I highly disagree- because like other tools and features- it depends on HOW the photographer uses the tool or feature. Like HDR, the creative features can be used tastefully or look "overcooked". Film photographers who use a variety of different films in film cameras- is this "just fun", or do they offer creative options? I encourage John and any listeners to look up the Olympus Visionaries and many other professionals using Olympus cameras in their daily work to see the amazing results they create with them. Instead of the same old Nikon and Canon "muscle-flexing" biases- lets look at what the pros produce with the camera tools. All modern cameras are superb and capable of great results. And this PEN-F camera offers groundbreaking control over the image making IN CAMERA at the time of exposure- which can be used to adjust an accompanying RAW file if needed. Not everyone wants to sit in front of a computer for hours doing post processing.

Jay Linsenbigler
 

Awesome course and thorough description of the PEN-F capabilities and functions. HOWEVER, John's "big boy camera" bias comes through when he describes some of the creative functions as "just fun". I highly disagree- because like other tools and features- it depends on HOW the photographer uses the tool or feature. Like HDR, the creative features can be used tastefully or look "overcooked". Film photographers who use a variety of different films in film cameras- is this "just fun", or do they offer creative options? I encourage John and any listeners to look up the Olympus Visionaries and many other professionals using Olympus cameras in their daily work to see the amazing results they create with them. Instead of the same old Nikon and Canon "muscle-flexing" biases- lets look at what the pros produce with the camera tools. All modern cameras are superb and capable of great results. And this PEN-F camera offers groundbreaking control over the image making IN CAMERA at the time of exposure- which can be used to adjust an accompanying RAW file if needed. Not everyone wants to sit in front of a computer for hours doing post processing.

Kate Mooney
 

The Pen 5 is an amazing camera - however it is capable of so much that getting to know it can be somewhat overwhelming at first. John systematically and logically works through every part of the camera in really clear and easy to understand steps, quickly converting my initial apprehension into confidence and excitement for the endless possibilities of this camera.

Student Work

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