Olympus PEN E-P2 digital camera resource

Last update: Feb. 2nd, 2012 Feb. 2nd: Lenses section updated

Will you help me?

Technical data and reference manuals

• Olympus E-P2 complete specifications
• Software for the E-P2 can be downloaded here.
• The complete reference manual can be downloaded here.
• See here the FAQs of Olympus America.
• Here are the Q&A of Olympus Japan with a comparison between the E-P2 and the E-P1
  

Reviews and previews

• Generally speaking there currently is a dearth of long, in-depth reviews of the Olympus E-P2. This is probably because the E-P2 was launched less than a year after the E-P1 and is just an incremental improvement, although a very good one. Here are the reviews, previews, first looks and relevant articles I have found so far, sorted by relevancy:
  

• Steve's Digicams have a detailed multipage review of the E-P2.
• Let's go digital have published a multipage review of the E-P2 with several test images.
• Photographyblog have a multipage review of the Olympus E-P2 with many tests.
• digitalcamerareview have a multipage review of the Olympus E-P2 with several tests.
• photoreview.com have a detailed long review of the Olympus E-P2 with many tests.
  
• John Foster wrote a detailed review about the Olympus E-P2, with many tests and images.
• The cameralabs.com review is interesting and contains a side-by-side comparison to the Nikon D90.
• Steve Huff have a review of the Olympus E-P2 on his site. Not that scientific and in fact without tests, but quite interesting, since he tests the camera from a photographer's perspective.
• For those undecided betwen the Olympus E-P2 and the Panasonic GF1 neutralday has a comparison page between these two cameras with several sample images.
  
• Here is a review in Japanese of the Olympus E-P2 (translated into English) of the dcwatch site. Many test images and some videos.
• techradar have a review of the Olympus E-P2 with some sample images.
  
• Imaging Resource have an interesting hands on preview of the Olympus E-P2 with lots of data but no tests.
• DCResource have an interesting and detailed first look of the Olympus E-P2 with lots of data but no tests.
• Andrzej Wrotniak has an interesting article about the Olympus E-P2 and the micro 4/3 system in general on his site, however without tests since he didn't buy the camera.
• Luminous landscape have an article about the Olympus E-P2, with the author reporting his experience with the E-P2 during a field trip to a national park.
• CNET Asia have a brief review with no tests about the Olympus E-P2.
  
• The Online Photographer have an article about the Olympus E-P2.

Sample images

• Steve's Digicams has 31 full resolution samples taken with the 14-42 lens at different ISO settings.
• letsgodigital.org have a page with some  high resolution samples at ISO settings from 200 to 800.
• photographyblog have a page with 38 sample images in JPEG format taken at different ISO settings and three ISO 200 RAW images.
• digitalcamerareview have a page with several sample images of the Olympus E-P2 taken at ISOs from 100 to 6400.
• dpinterface have a page with 18 samples of the Olympus E-P2 taken at ISOs ranging from 100 to 1600.
  

RAW file format

• Dave Coffin is listing on his dcraw page every RAW image processing software which either is using his decoder or use the decoder as documentation (scroll down to "Other Raw Photo Decoders").
  
• Some of these packages are free, some are not.
  
• If you use Photoshop you will need CS4 or later versions, because CS3 (or earlier versions) cannot import the camera raw file filters needed for the Olympus E-P2 RAWs. The only option with earlier Photoshop versions is to convert to DNG with the free Adibe DNG converter.
  
• Another good RAW converter is Olympus Studio.
• Even Irfanview can decode E-P2 RAW files, thanks to the dcraw code.
  

Memory cards

• The E-P2 takes SD memory cards only (no CF or xD cards). It is compatible to SDHC cards and Olympus recommends Class 6 cards.
  
• There are no test reports about this, but the top write performance should be the same as the one of the E-P1: a sustained 1.3 RAW images/s and 1.9 SHQ JPEG images/second, i.e. a sustained write speed performance around 18 MB/s.
  

Firmware

• Firmware update v1.1:
• Improved auto focus speed.
• Improved tracking of C-AF (continuous AF) when recording movies while using M.ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 9-18mm F4.0-5.6 or M.ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 14-150mm F4.0-5.6.
• Support for the new M.ZUIKO DIGITAL ED 9-18mm F4.0-5.6 lens. Frame rate of live view may be reduced if this lens is used without updating firmware.
• Improved operation so menus and images can be displayed on the rear LCD monitor when using the electronic viewfinder VF-2.
• Improved display of the electronic viewfinder VF-2 when using the GRAINY FILM art filter.
  
• Firmware updates for the E-P2 can be downloaded here.

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus E-P2 user group

Chromatic aberrations / Purple fringing

• To remove chromatic aberrations you can process the RAW image with the Adobe Photohop RAW plugin or with the PTlens filter.
  
• To remove chromatic aberrations with an image editor (desaturation of the magentas):
• 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).

Accessories

• See here all accessories for the Olympus E-P2.
• Basically the E-P2 takes the same accessories as the E-P1, except for the EVF and other accessories which can be inserted into the port of the E-P2.
  

Infrared photography with the Olympus E-P2

• 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.

Lenses

• Micro four thirds lenses are currently available from Olympus, Leica and Panasonic:

• Four thirds lenses are currently available from Olympus and Leica and can be used with the MMF-1, MMF-2 or DMW-MA1 adapters.
• See here which lenses are compatible with the MMF-1 adapter.

• Wide angle and Fisheye

External flash

• The Olympus E-P2 has a standard flash hotshoe and can take standard external flashes (among others the FL-20, FL-36 and FL-50).
• Try out the Metz flash units - cheap and reliable. Alternatively try the FL-36 or other Olympus flash units.
  
• See here for how to measure the trigger voltage of your flash.

Controlling the Olympus E-P2 with a computer

• Currently no software with which you can control the E-P2 with a computer is available. Olympus Studio can't be used for this.
 

Underwater Photography

• No underwater housing from Olympus is available yet.
  
• There is an underwater case from Athena, the OM-P1. This is waterproof to depths of 60m and has clear ports for viewing the important parts of the snapper such as the mode dial and, of course, the rear LCD. This however costs an arm and a leg, at 1790 Euro (= 2400 USD at the current exchange rate).
• Note that you'll need to spend more money for lens ports, strobes etc., all items ranging between 400 and 1300 Euro.
  
• The site Digideep.com is an online directory for digital underwater photography.
• Interesting forum for underwater photography: DigitalDiver.net

Data recovery

• Jpegdump, by Kurt Stege, is a free tool to recover deleted images from a memory card. Recommended, alough it involves more work an e tool of Convar.
  
• These software tools are not free, so since Convar's software is available for free, there is no real need to use them:
  
• Datarescue also has a software tool (Photorescue) for repairing damaged memory cards, although it's not free.
• Photorecovery is another tool. Price is $39.95.

Noise reduction

• In addition to the E-P2's inbuilt noise reduction, you can post-process the images with NeatImage. This software package produces surprisingly good results.
• Here is a comparison of different noise reduction software tools.

Exposure information data (EXIF)

• The picture files of the Olympus E-P2 contain the complete exposure information (aperture, exposure time, focal leng, white balance etc.).
• 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. "

Questions ? Comments ? Put them in the Olympus E-P2 user group

Panorama shots

• Personally I can recommend PTGUI (which I have been using for years now): not free but an excellent piece of software.
  
• Some interesting links:
• http://www.skipwilliams.com/panos/panorama_links.htm
• http://www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~bernardk/tutorials/360/calibrate/
• http://www.johnhpanos.com/pttute.htm
• Tripod specific for panoramas: http://www.kaidan.com/

Astrophotography with the Olympus E-P2

• Here is an astrophotography forum for users of the Olympus DSLRs
  
• Astrophotography users's group here
• This may be also a good source.

Links

• MyOlympus.org photo sharing site: here Olympus E-P2 users can upload images and give/get feedback
• Yahoo Olympus E-P2 discussion group: a discussion group dedicated to e Olympus E-P2 digital camera