First photos

So, no post yesterday. Circumstances, for example shovelling snow, kept me away. Today, however, the E-1 has leapt into action. Taking advantage of a business trip over the Alps, I stopped off at a few places to try it out. The weather was still both foul and boring, but there were a few better moments. I just used the 14-54mm lens for these first trials.

I'll post some photos soon, when I decide how I'm going to organise it. But my first impressions are very good. First of all, I'm relieved to report that I like the 4/3 framing. I expected to, having taken to 6x7 very quickly, but you never no. Next point, this camera just works. The learning curve, even when coming from manual focus Canon SLRs, is practically non-existent. Most controls work on the "press a button and rotate a dial basis", with the added feature that you have two dials to choose from. So far I've only discovered one mode where the two dials do different things, which is setting aperture and speed in M mode. The comment that the buttons seem to be randomly spread all over the camera has some justification, but you soon get used to it. I found that the DOF preview button didn't immediately fall to hand, but again, after a few minutes it became second nature.

The viewfinder is superb. It does not feel at all restrictive. I don't know quite why, because it clearly is much smaller than the one on my T90 for example, but it isn't noticeable. However, I think investing in the eye cup might improve things even more.

On the menu front, well again it is easy to use, but I should say that I have been using an Olympus C4040Z for the past two years, and the logic is similar. One thing which I haven't seen reported anywhere is that the Info mode "remembers" its last setting. So, if you choose histogram view (requiring click Play, press and hold Info, rotate dial) the exit, the next time you click Play then Info, you get the histogram. Not quite such a pain in the neck as some have suggested. I guess a single button press, like on other DSLRs, would be nice, but this is hardly awkward.

One thing I haven't taken much notice of yet is changing the default settings. Apart from changing the colour space to Adobe RGB I've left it all as it is. I may well be wrong but so far I assume that all of this stuff is relevant only to processed images, not RAW. Still, as I've using RAW + JPEG, I will probably tweak the settings so that it produces JPEGs as I want them.

For some shots I used my tripod, with the Acratech ball head. I used a Really Right Stuff plate - model ..., which I bought for the T90. It isn't ideal as the curved base of the E-1 body doesn't fit very well. Really Right Stuff claim to have released an E-1 specific plate, but when you try to order it, a different, generic (and cheaper) plate ends up in the shopping basket. I'll call them tonight to clarify this.