Olympus C5060 wide zoom digital camera resource

Latest additions: Aug. 29th, 2007 Aug. 29th: Mode dial section updated Apr. 8th: Technical data section updated (current drain test by Warthog) Nov 20th: BLM-1 battery and RAW section updated

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Technical data and reference manuals

• Olympus Europe specifications
• The complete reference manual for the Olympus 5060 WZ is available for download. Click here.
• Click here for the basic guide.
• The CCD used in the 5060 should be this one manufactured by Sony:
• ICX452AQ
• Chip size is 8.23mm x 6.68 mm; diagonal is 9.04 mm (1/1.8")
• Pixel size is 2.78 x 2.78 micrometer
• Complete specifications are available here

• Here you will find a PDF with a complete list of parts of the 5060, with part numbers and detailed exploded parts diagram. Here is a price list with the parts prices (the prices service shops centres).
• Warthog prepared a comparison table listing the current consumption of the Olympus 5060 compared to the Olympus E300. You will see that the E300 consumes less power than the C5060.
  

Reviews

• Digit.no have posted their review of the Olympus C-5060 (review in Norwegian)
  
• Here is a review of the 5060 (in Slovenian, but with many interesting images)
• See the (not so impressive) review of PCReview
• Dec 17th: Megapixel.net published their review of the C5060.
Comment: they rate the 5060 with 8.6 for functionality and 9.6 (out of 10) for image quality - one of the highest scores they have ever given to a "compact high end" digital camera. Only DSLRs score higher for image quality. The 5060 is an excellent camera, the only drawback is the lens aperture.
• Dec. 6th: see Mr. Wrotniak's technical review of the 5060. Also see his comparison of the 5050 and 5060.
• Dec. 5th: DCResource posted their review of the 5060.
• Nov. 21st: full review of the 5060 posted by Imaging Resource (production camera)
• Nov 18th: two new reviews of the Olympus 5060 in Japanese:
• Review 1
• Review 2
• Review by Steve's Digicams: with a pre-production C-5060, no sample images yet.
• See the press release

Sample images

• Dec. 6th: See the samples posted by Andrzej Wrotniak on his site. These are several samples of outdoor and indoor shots.
• Nov 7th: Jim posted more samples, this time to pbase.
• Nov. 6th: Jim Ingraham posted some samples on his site. CAUTION: LARGE FILES ! (takes a while to download)
Comment: quality is very good - both chromatic aberrations and noise are low.
• See the sample images on the Olympus Japan site.
Comment: noise seems lower than in the first sample images of the 5050. Possibly Olympus introduced a noise reduction filter into the 5060.

 

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus 5060 user group

RAW file format

• Give a try to Silkypix's Developer Studio RAW converter. Not free, but it is getting very good feedback from those who are using it. It seems to be THE raw converter with virtually any control you can imagine. Some feedback from Jerry Beggs:
• "I have tried the Silkypics raw converter - it is the best I've found and importantly, it runs on old pc's; I use Windows ME on a PIII 800 processor with 256mb RAM.  It works perfectly and is fast enough.  Many of the new RAW convertors like Pixmantecs Rawshooter Essentials and Phase One's Capture will not run on less than 500mb RAM and Windows XP. "
  
• Give a try to the RAW converter from Pixmantec (RawShooter Essentials - free so far), which has received very positive reviews.
  
• The latest release of Adobe Photoshop CS supports the 5060 RAW file format (download an actual plugin from the Adobe site).
• Another Free program that can view RAW is Picasa2 available from www.picasa.com
• See this page with a comparison of RAW and SHQ JPEG images (note: 5050 RAW images).
• Karl Johnson created this page comparing RAW, TIFF, SHQ and HQ images. For RAW conversion he used the Adobe Photoshop RAW plugin. Comments:
• Interestingly HQ is more smooth than SHQ.
• (The output of Adobe PS) RAW is smoothest and contains the least noise, but also less detail compared to SHQ.
• With the Camedia Master that comes with the 5060 you can browse, open, and save the 5060 .ORF RAW file as an Exif TIFF (8 bit). You can set saturation, contrast and sharpening The ExifReader software is able to open the TIFF and read the Exif header.
• More links to information on RAW format:
• Converting RAW to TIFF and the pros and cons of processing/saving 16 bit vs 8 bit TIFF.
• Discusses RAW format with a Canon D30 yet may still be enlightening in regard to using RAW format for C-5060 digital photographs.
• Digital raw diamonds: discusses the benefits of the RAW file format.

 
 

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus 5060 user group

Memory cards

• See here for an official compatibility chart from Olympus showing which memory are compatible with the 5060.
  
• See here for CompactFlash and Microdrive compatible with C-5060 Wide Zoom. This table shows which CF card types have been tested for compatibility with the 5060.
  Note: of course there are lots of CF card brands and types which are compatible with the 5060 and are not listed there.
• See this memory card speed test (data kindly supplied by the members of the Olympus 5060 users group)
• It appears that the 5060 writes to the memory card three times slower than the 5050 (see the memory card speed test by Jens Birch to get an idea of the write speeds of the 5050 with different memory cards). Try doing the following:
• Shoot four RAW images in the Hi Drive mode
• Measure with a stopwatch the time needed to
• a) shoot these four RAW images and
• b) the time the camera needs to write the four RAW images to the memory card
• It appears that the 5060 needs 1.8 seconds for a) and 33 seconds for b) with a fast CF card. The 5050 needs 1.8 seconds and 11 seconds respectively (measured with the 512MB 30x Transcend CF card I'm using).
• It's not clear why the 5060 is so much slower than the 5050. In any case, the long write times make the 5060 less suitable for shooting images in RAW mode.

• Generally speaking CF (CompactFlash) cards are cheaper than xD cards. Fast CF cards are also faster than xD cards in the Olympus 5060, so the only reason to use xD cards is if you want to use the camera's panorama function (note however that you can shoot panos by setting the camera into manual mode and locking the white balance, or setting the camera into manual mode and shooting RAW).
• So, unless you want to use the Olympus 5060 panorama function, the question becomes: which CF card to use ?
  
• Well, the 5060 limits the read/write speed to about 1 MByte/s - that corresponds to about a 7x speed (1x is 150 KByte/s).
• This means that even a cheap 12x CF card is perfectly adequate and very fast CF cards are not necessary, as the camera is the limiting factor. In other words, if you buy an expensive 65x CF card for usage with the 5060 you are wasting your money.
  

Firmware

• Firmware v756-84 is now the latest firmware for the 5060. You can only get it, if you send in the camera to Olympus. The following has been reported about this firmware by a user:
• Lower noise levels
• Autofocus in low light is better, but still a bit slow
• Overall the camera responds faster
  
• Firmware v756-83 can be downloaded from this site. This is apparently an inofficial download, as it is a .bin file. To install it, follow this procedure:
• Take a memory card and format it in the camera.
• With a card reader, create a "firmware" directory in the root directory of the card (the one containing the DCIM directory).
• Rename the firmware file to "firmware.bin" and copy it to the firmware directory in the memory card.
• Set the camera into playback mode and insert the memory card.
• Switch on the camera.
• A menu will appear, showing the current firmware version and giving you two menu options ("yes" and "no").
• If you choose "yes" (use the arrow buttons) the camera will update the firmware.
• IMPORTANT: MAKE SURE THAT THE BATTERIES ARE FULLY CHARGED OR USE AN A/C ADAPTER. If the camera loses the power during the flash operation, you'll have to send the camera to Olympus for servicing.

• The latest firmware can now be downloaded from the site of Olympus.
  
• Details of the update:
• Improvement in the quality of RAW image data (lower noise level) in CAMEDIA Master. (There is no problem in original RAW image data taken by a camera.) 
  
• Shutter click is set to sound twice in BULB shooting: when pushing the shutter button and when you release your finger from the button.
• Changed the camera's default resolution setting in movie mode to HQ (320 x 240 pixels) as described in the instruction manual.
• Revised the display of shutter speed in detailed shooting information.
• Revised ALL RESET in the camera. When you power off the camera while the AF target is displayed on the monitor, the next time you turn on the camera, the setting is retained, so only the AF target is displayed on the monitor.
• Revised Frame Assist templates.
• Note
• You cannot return to the previous version of firmware after the update.
  

Chromatic aberrations / Purple fringing

• To remove chromatic aberrations with an image editor:
• It is very simple to remove chromatic aberrations from an image. Simply use a photo editor and set the saturation level of magenta (also green where this makes sense) to the minimum. In some images you might have to set the saturation level of red to the minimum. It might also make sense to limit the processing to the affected area (i.e. select the affected image area and only process that).
• See "How to deal with chromatic aberrations" by Philipp Sanke. Philipp describes a number of ways to avoid or remove chromatic aberrations.

Polariser filter and other filters

• See this thread in the 5060 users group (note: first sign up with Yahoo). Here follows an extract:
• According to info on the web (very limited!!!) CLA-7 has bayonet mount, there's not a word about threaded mount. Unfortunately (according to the Olympus CZ answer) CLA-5 doesn't work with 5060WZ. So I thought that a solution could be a 40.5-55mm step-up ring, but I didn't find any, all very only from 40.5 to max 49mm.
• Olympus released in December 2003 a protective filter, UV filter, and a polarizer filter for the 5060. Go to the bottom of this page.
• A polariser filter helps to obtain deep blue skies and to remove unwanted reflections. Consider the following example (both images taken with the polariser filter):

 

Perhentian island image

Same image with polariser rotated by 90 degrees

• See the difference ? In the picture to the right, the polariser filter substantially reduced the amount of light reflected by the water surface making the sea ground more visible and made the sky more dark.
• Polariser filters are also useful when the lower part of the image is dark and the top (the sky) too bright.
• Have a look at Darwin Wigget's page on filters for further information on polariser, blue-yellow polariser, graduated neutral density and other filters
• See also Jeremy McCreary's page on filters

Accessories

• Nov. 18th:
• See this (Japanese) site with good pictures of the coming accesories to the C5060 WZ.
• Interesting to see is the lens tube CLA-7 featuring a bayonet connection to the TCON-17C and WCON-07C lenses.
• Also a "power battery holder" B-HLD20, which looks like it will integrate with the camera body, looks promising for those who need a lot of juice during a long days shooting.
• There are polarizing and UV filters (supposedly) shown as well but with a filter diameter of 40.5 mm.
• Also the other goodies for under water photography and carrying the camera are displayed with nice large pictures if you click on the thumbnails.
Jens Birch, Olympus 5060 users group
• Here is the official Japanese accessories site.
• The B-HLD20 battery holder is also having a portrait shutter button. A close-up view can be found here.
• Some images:
• 5060 with CLA-7 / TCON-17C
• 5060 with B-HLD20 and FL-20
• 5060 with 40.5mm polarizer filter
No adaptor required - the lens cover should be directly attached to the thread.
• 5060 with B-HLD20 and CLA-7 / WCON-07C
• Image 1
• Image 2
• Image 3
• 5060 with CLA-7 and extra battery only

BLM-1 battery and cheaper 3rd party alternatives

• See this page which contains an overview of currently available BLM-1 battery clones: Olympus BLM-1 (original), PS-BLM1 (7DayShop.com), WT-BLM1 (SterlingTek.com), Energizer OM-1, Hahnel HL-M1, UNiROSS VB104295, WinTop PS-BLM1 and e-Film (Delkin) BLM1. The author rates the batteries according to construction, capacity, (low voltage) protection and cost. It appears that not all 3rd party alternatives are created equal.
• Test added which shows which capacity the original Olympus BLM-1 battery and cheap 3rd party alternatives have. With the batteries I had (one original and two 3rd party ones) I measured the following:
• Original Olympus battery:   1299 mAh
  
• 3rd party battery 1:   1077 mAh
  
• 3rd party battery 2:   744 mAh
• This is OK, since the Olympus original BLM-1 battery costs 17 times more than the 3rd party alternatives I bought.
• The complete test results are available here.

• The original BLM-1 battery from Olympus is very expensive, selling at prices of 70 Euro upwards (a Dutch user even reported that the BLM-1 costs 119 Euro in the Netherlands) - a multiple of what a NiMH battery set costs. Since February 2004 cheap 3rd party alternatives to the BLM-1 battery are available from a number of sources (mainly sellers on ebay - do a search for "BLM-1" on ebay).
• The questions then are
  
• how good these cheaper alternatives are and
  
• whether they can they be used without problems in the Olympus 5060.
  
• The original BLM-1 battery from Olympus is rated at 7.2 Volt and 1500 mAh. The alternatives have voltages of 7.2 or 7.4 Volt and capacities of 1300 or 1500 mAh.
• The voltage difference is no problem:
  
• The 7.2 Volt which Olympus officially quotes varies in reality between 6.7 Volt (discharged battery) and 7.7 Volt (fully charged battery). These are voltages measured under a pretty heavy load of over 1 Ampere (battery loaded with a 6.8 Ohm resistor).
  
• With no load the measured voltages become 7.37 Volt in a discharged state (emtpy battery screen showing) and 8.2 Volt (battery fully charged).
  => In other words, it's highly irrelevant if the battery is rated at 7.2 or 7.4 Volt - the camera can withstand 7.7 Volts without problems.
• The capacity difference is also something not to worry about. There is no big difference between 1500 and 1300 mAh (we are talking of a 10% difference), but the 3rd party battery costs a fraction of the original one.
• Personally I bought two 3rd party BLM-1 batteries in August 2004 from a Hong Kong eBay seller.
  
• Price per battery was US $ 5.49 and the total cost including shipping was US $17.
  
• The batteries arrived in 10 days to my home in Germany.
  
• I tested one of these cheap "counterfeit" batteries. It lasted for over 600 shots (SHQ, all with the LCD on, about 10% with flash) and still had juice left when I got tired and interrupted the test. It just wouldn't die.
  
• Vidpro fast battery charger (this has been reported by Rod in the Olympus 5060 users group):
  
• My results are the Oly charger took around 5 hours to get to a full charge and the Vidpro about half that (which is what they advertise). BUT, it could be the second battery I charged on the Vidpro didn't need that much charging - what I did wasn't under very controlled conditions re residual charge before recharging.
• The Vidpro (US $30) charger base is a little larger than the Oly, and also has an AC to DC module (a little smaller than the Oly unit itself) that plugs into the AC wall socket whereas the Oly unit accepts AC directly with the supplied AC cord. Both the Oly & Vidpro accept 100v-240v, but the big difference I like is that the Vidpro has a 12v DC (vehicle, etc.) adapter allowing the batteries to be charged in the field.
  

Infrared photography with the Olympus 5060

Courtesy of Eddie Wiseman Photo taken about noontime; Manual exposure, AF, ISO 80, 15" @ f8 with a HOYA RM72 IR  filter(49mm)

• The 5060 is not very sensitive to infrared light, due to an internal infrared cut-off filter. You need long exposure times.
• See the comment of Eddie Wiseman, posted in the Olympus 5060 users group:
• It works - however, be prepared for LOOOONG shutter speeds and the use of a tripod..Using a HOYA R72 (AKA "RM72") filter, I'm getting 15" at f8, iso 80 in bright sun..If I go to f5.6 of course I can cut that time to 7.5"..Or if I dare to use ISO400....etc etc..The bottom line is that you will not be able to hand-hold this camera..sturdy means of support is necessary....I haven't had many chances to get out and shoot here about 20 miles north of Boston, where everything outdoors is brown dirty and lacking of GREEN foliage.. Also, before you ask, Hoya starts this filter off at 49mm..I suggest you go up a size or two (ie 52/55mm) so that you don't get any vignetting at the W/A setting..Of course you will need the appropriate sized step-up ring as well..
  

• The site Infrared photography with your digital camera contains interesting information about infrared photography with Olympus cameras and an overview of infrared filters with their spectral characteristics.
• These sites contain useful information about infrared photography with digital cameras:
• Echeng.com: Digital infrared photography - site devoted to digital infrared photography with image galleries, information about filters and equipment and links.
• Wrotniak's Infrared Photography page - excellent information resource devoted to infrared photography with Olympus cameras. Information about infrared filters, exposure settings, focus, post-processing, sample images and links.
• Also see the Infrared photography page of the Apogee magazine: this is an interesting general introduction to infrared photography with digital cameras.

Auxiliary lenses

• TCON-30C - Tele Conversion Lens with bajonet mount
• 3x teleconverter, which got good reviews (good sharpness)
• The adapter CLA-7 is required.
  
• See the Olympus site for a complete description
  
• Olympus TCON 17
• Brief description: Oly TCON 17, Soligor adapter + 52->55 step-up ring
  Picture quality: no visible drop in quality, I didn't check it pixel by pixel
  Image sharpness: no visible drop in sharpness
  Level of chromatic aberration (if the lens increases it): not increased
  Vignetting: usable only at tele position, vigneting approx on 3/4 of range
  How satisfied:  fine - apart from the rear thread... it seams not to be as durable as it should, I plan to buy additional 52->55 step-up to keep it on all the time
  Marian Harustak
  
  
• MCON-40 close up unit
• I have acquired an Olympus MCON-40 close-up unit, a 55mm thread fit close-up achromat lens with two elements, with somewhat better optical quality than the traditional single element types. This unit is a rebadged version of the B-Macro unit for Olympus iS-series bridge (film) cameras, and is compatible with any camera that has 55mm thread fit lens or adapter. Olympus Europe has a page showing the models that are compatible, though I don't have the address available right now.
  Simon Evans
  
• Mr Wrotniak review the WCON-07C and TCON-17C auxiliary lenses with the Olympus 5060. See his detailed report.
  
• Olympus has released the TCON-17C teleconverter lens and the WCON-07C wide angle converter lens for usage with the 5060. Some pictures of these lenses here.
• Some interesting links:
• Michael Meissner's page on wide angle lenses for the Olympus C-2100UZ camera contains an overview of wide angle lenses with different thread sizes (43 - 62 mm). Although I can't confirm it, these lenses should also be usable with the Olympus 4040 with an appropriate adapter.
• The page of Jeremy McCreary  Auxiliary lenses for Oly Camedias contains an in-depth analysis of the topic.
• Olympus Digital Accessories compatibility page: lists all accessories and tells if they are compatible with the 5050

External flash

• See Michael Meissner's excellent page on Olympus External Flash Support. It contains an overview of external flash units which can be used with the 5050 (as well as with other Olympus digital cameras).

• See here for how to measure the trigger voltage of your flash.
• See this interesting thread on external flashes "Olympus FL-40 or PROMASTER 5750 DX ?"
• See Jeremy McCreary'page on external flash for Camedia cameras.
• See the Olympus Digital Accessories compatibility page: lists all accessories and tells if they are compatible with the 5060

Mode dial failure issue

• Here is a comment by somebody:
  "I found I could get my 5060 back in usable condition after a mode dial failure by pressing down on the dial while turning the power on and off a few times.  A friend with the same camera has been doing this too since his had the failure before mine.  Seems to happen in the rainy season at the end of summer here in Albuquerque, NM."
  
• Reports of weird failures of the 5060 started appearing in the Olympus 5060 users group as early as in December 2003. This was dismissed by Olympus as an isolated accident, a bad production batch. Well, now in September 2004 the issue is still here and well alive.
  
• The culmination of the whole story happened when even Mr Wrotniak, who bought an Olympus 5060 to complement his Olympus 5050, experienced the mode dial failure issue with his 5060. That prompted him to set up a page about it.
• Here is a description of the problem:
  
• The symptoms of a mode dial failure may not look exactly the same in all cameras. The camera's buttons and menu system may become unresponsive in association with the use of the dial. Unexpected menus may pop up or the camera may get stuck on some unintended setting. From owner reports, it appears that this is caused by a failure with the dial hardware.
• If this happens to, send the camera to Olympus for repairs (hopefully it's still in warranty).
  

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus 5060 user group

Controlling the Olympus 5060 with a computer

• Try these software packages
• Thanks to Peter Huebner for reporting that Pine Tree Camera Controller works with the 5050 (and possibly also with the 5060):
• "I installed the Pinetree Camera Controller on my PC. Open Media door on the camera, turn on, press OK/Menu button and LCD display button simultaneously for a few seconds, a menu pops up on the LCD screen - put camera in to control mode. Close Media door, plug in USB cable and fire up the software (the software won't work if the camera is not in control mode!). First time round the software asks you to select the camera, they then engage in a lengthy dialogue (I felt quite left out) and then it simply works! I found the software had set my camera to something like 640x400 resolution - and the next time I went to use it in the field it was still in that resolution, and I didn't notice until later! Beware :-)."
• Also see "How to put the camera into PC control mode"
  
• Cam2Com: see this information.
• Akond.net are developing a software for camera control. It's not free, but you might give it a try.
 

Travelling and storage

• August 03: I just bought a Vosonic X's Drive 2. Without HD (I had one already) the price was below 100 Euro. This thing comes with a fast USB2 interface and will read Smartmedia, CF I and II, Memory sticks and SD/MMC cards. As far as I know this external storage device is currently the lowest cost device available. Quality and performance are good.
• Update 09.06.03: new portable storage devices (do a Google search to find the manufacturers' sites):
• the Archos Multimedia Jukebox w/photo attachment 20 gb - also plays mp3s. Costs more.
• SuperDigibin - includes ac charger / car charger - 30 gb
• Disc Steno - burn cds from flash card
• Nixvue Vizor - burns cds from flash cards, spans discs for large cards, playback on tv.
• Tripper - similar to digibin
• Flashtrax from smartdisk (not out yet) - 2.5 inch lcd, plays mp3s, image playback on device, costs more.
• EZ DigiMagic: burns CDs directly from the memory card (but how do you know that the burning process was successful? ...)
• When travelling I use a Toshiba subnotebook (P1 133MHz with 64 MB RAM) to store, catalog and process  the images. There are also portable storage devices, but the advantage of the subnotebook is that all image processing (i.e. deleting bad ones, sorting them etc.) can be done while travelling. That's especially relevant on long trips. The disadvantage is that a subnotebook is bulkier and heavier than a portable storage device.
• Portable storage devices:
• Digital Wallet - a portable HD with a card reader with 3 - 20 GB capacity
• ImageTank - a portable HD with a card reader with up to 40 GB capacity
• Nixvue - same as Digital Wallet, ImageTank etc. but has a small colour LCD screen to view the pictures - up to 20 GB capacity
• Reto's Image Tank review  has a comparison of these different solutions

Underwater Photography

• See this detailed review of the PT020 underwater housing, complete with photos of the housing, its parts and the housing for the FL20 external flash.
• Oct. 12th: Olympus is releasing the PT-020, a new underwater housing for the 5060. See the press release on Olympus Japan's site (if you speak Japanese). For those who are not fluent in Japanese, here is a translation posted by laz217 on the wetpixel.com forum:
• "Waterproof protector

Waterproof protector " PT-020 " (desired retail price: If 28,000 Yen, November last third sale schedule) you use, feeling at rest even with the outdoor scene, and the business scene and the like with the outside it can do photographing. It is the protector of active real specification even with diving which actualizes the pressure-resistant depth of water 40m. As for this protector with Olympus first system protector, portion of protector the wide port " PPO-02 " for PT-020 of selling separately (desired retail price: 16,000 Yen, November last third sale schedule) by the fact that you exchange, real underwater wide photographing becomes possible when private conversion lens adapter " CLA-7 " and wide conversion lens " WCON-0C7c " are installed in the camera. In addition, flash " FL-20 " outside exclusive use (desired retail price: 15,000 Yen) waterproof protector " PFL-01 " of business (desired retail price: If 28,000 Yen, November last third sale schedule) you use, TTL automatic photographing at underwater becomes possible."
• The site Digideep.com is an online directory for digital underwater photography.
• Interesting forum for underwater photography: DigitalDiver.net

Data recovery

• Convar's PC Inspector Smart Recovery tool now supports JPEG, TIFF and RAW. Freeware - highly recommended.
• Check this site: Digital image recovery
Christian Grau has some software tools to fix damaged memory cards. The software used to be free, now costs $39.
• Datarescue also has a software tool (Photorescue) for repairing damaged memory cards, although it's not free.
• Also have a look at PC Inspector's File Recovery. It's free.
• Jpegdump, by Kurt Stege, is a free tool to recover deleted images from a memory card - HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
• Photorecovery is another tool. Price is $39.95.

Noise reduction

• In addition to the 5060's inbuilt noise reduction, you can post-process the images with NeatImage. This software packaga produces surprisingly good results.
• Here there is a comparison of different noise reduction software tools.
  

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus 5060 user group

Exposure information data (EXIF)

• The picture files of the Olympus 5060 contain the complete exposure information (aperture, exposure time, focal length, white balance and so on).
• This data is usually lost when you edit the pictures; but some modern image editing software packages keep the data intact when saving the processed intact.
• To read this data you can use these software tools:
• ExifReader, by Ryuuji Yoshimoto. Haven't tried the software myself, but it looks interesting. Freeware.
• Exif Image Viewer, by Michal Kowalski. This is the one I'm using. Quoting from his homepage:
"EXIF viewer is a simple image viewer application for photos taken with digital cameras. It's capable of reading EXIF information embedded in photos as well as little thumbnail. Because small thumbnail is already present in most photos displaying it is really fast.
EXIF viewer can also provide detailed information about photos (shutter speed, aperture, etc.) and conveniently list them for comparison purposes.
EXIF viewer also displays image histogram. It also features copying/moving and deleting of selected photos. Single photograph can be displayed in separate window or in a full screen mode."
• Exifer, by Friedemann Schmidt. I'm using this one too. It can rewrite EXIF data to images which lost it due to processing with a software package which doesn't support EXIF. Quoting from his site:
"Exifer is a nearly free software (you only should send me a postcard if you're using Exifer frequently) with which you can manage the metadata (EXIF/IPTC) of pictures taken by digital cameras. Because many image processing software destroys this metadata when saving such files, the idea was to create a backup of the metadata before editing it in any software, and then, after that to restore it back into the processed file. With Exifer you can do this very easily. "

Panorama shots

• Some interesting links:
• http://www.skipwilliams.com/panos/panorama_links.htm
• http://www.htu.at/~sascha/ptguide/
• http://www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~bernardk/tutorials/360/calibrate/
• http://homepage.ntlworld.com/j.houghton/pttute.htm
• http://www.panoguide.com/software/reviews/panotools_v21.html
• Stitching software: http://www.vrtoolbox.com/vrthome.html
• Tripod specific for panoramas: http://www.kaidan.com/

Linux and the 5060

• Tobias Reif managed to connect the 5060 to a computer using Linux. Here is his report:

 

here are the steps (I'm on Suse 9.0 [1]): 1. boot Suse (optionally do $ sudo tail -f /var/log/messages ) 2. connect: 0. * use external power supply * "SETUP" -> "USB" must be set to "PC" (not "PRINT") * set playback mode on cam * make sure camera is turned off 1. connect with USB cable 2. turn camera on 3. watch: * drive icon appears on desktop: sda1 (rightclick -> properties: device /dev/sda1 mounted at /media/sda1) (clicking on it would mount the cam and open it in Konqueror "Icon View" => convenient thumbnail previews) (watch tail -f for USB stuff) ... or just wait a moment 4. get the pics: (as user:) $ mount | grep media $ mount /media/sda1 $ mount | grep media /dev/sda1 on /media/sda1 type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,sync,user=tobi) $ cd /media/sda1/dcim/100olymp/ $ cp -i ./* ~/data/move_to_cd/olyc5060_unchanged/ $ mv -i ./* ~/data/pics/olyc5060_changed/2004/01/10/ $ ls $ cd $ umount /media/sda1 $ mount | grep media $ turn cam off unplug cam

 
• Brian Miller created a page about using a Olympus C-5050Zoom Digital Camera with Linux. Tons of detailed information on how to interface the 5050 with Linux.
• The page Using the Olympus Camedia C-3040 Zoom Digital Camera with Linux and USB by Micheal Schubart contains a description on how to download photos from an Olympus 3040 to a computer running Linux with USB. The procedure described there should also apply to an Olympus 5050.

Astrophotography with the Olympus 5060

• See this gallery of moon shots by Miguel Fiallo
  
• Astrophotography users's group here
• This may be also a good source.
• And last but not least this site has enough links and information to keep you plugged for several lifetimes.

Links

• MyOlympus.org photo sharing site: similar to Photosig, here Olympus 5060 users can upload images and give/get feedback
• Yahoo Olympus C5060 discussion group: a discussion group dedicated to the Olympus C5060 digital camera

• Olympus 4040 online resource: an in-depth information resource on the Olympus 4040
• Olympus 5050 online resource: an in-depth information resource on the predecessor of the Olympus 5060
• Jeremy McCreary's dpfwiw site: Excellent site on the Olympus Camedia cameras
• Rob Galbraith's site has an article on Alex Majoli ("Alex Majoli points and shoots"), an award winning photojournalist who uses Olympus point and shoot cameras, the c-5050, -5060, and -8080.  Interesting reading.

FAQs

1. You can be prepared beforehand by 1/2-pressing the shutter button (and keeping it 1/2-pressed) while aiming at the subject before the actual moment when you want to take the picture. The autofocus (AF) and the aperture will be set and the camera will then take the picture with no time lag when you press the last 1/2-way.
2. By having the LCD switched on, the time to activate the cameras AF and metering will be reduced by about 2 seconds.
   
3. Set the camera to manual focus (MF) at the subject distance you intend to take the picture at. This is most easily done by aiming at an object at the distance you want to use and 1/2-pressing the shutter button. While keeping it 1/2-pressed, press the AF/Macro/MF button. That fixes the focus at the desired distance and the camera is set to MF. This will significantly reduce the shutter lag.
4. Set the camera to manual exposure (M) which further reduces the shutter lag.
5. When it is tricky to catch the moment, use Hi-drive sequential shooting and start taking pictures just before you think the action starts. Use the optical viewfinder in order to follow the action when the camera's LCD is occupied while taking the pictures.
6. Turn off the "REC-view in the "SETUP" tab in the "Mode Menu". That will minimize the time that the just taken picture is displayed and you will be ready for the next shot as soon as possible.
7. Use fully charged batteries if you are using the on-board flash. Otherwise it takes a long time to re-charge.

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