October 5, 2009 – London, Olympus announced the successor to their first compact micro four-thirds system (Olympus E-P1), the new PEN E-P2. Although it manage to fix several quirks of the previous model it STILL misses some critical points.

First let’s talk about what’s new in the latest rendition of the PEN. The most noticeable change is it’s accessory port which sits just above the huge LCD screen. It still doesn’t have a built in View Finder, but it now supports a tilt-able electronic external view finder bundled to every unit of the E-P2. It also features continuous AF tracking, which will enable you to create better movies by keeping the focused area in focus as it moves on the screen although I’m not sure if the new Continuous AF will fix the slow auto-focus issues known to occur in the older PEN E-P2. And lastly the new portable micro four-thirds from Oly now added a new Ardt Filter, Diorama: which makes photos look like small tiny things and Cross-Process which produces photos with striking colours and contrast to emilate effects achieved by silver halide film cross processing. Oh, I almost forgot the BEST feature of the E-P2 – “It makes the prices of the E-P1 more affordable” if I may call it a feature, I bet it will make early adopters unhappy but I would suggest not to upgrade to this one but instead get the other micro four-thirds from Panasonic, the GF-1. Cnet news have a comparison chart here.

The second iteration of the PEN is quite not enough. Why?, because there’s NO built-in flash, you need a plug-in flash which will diable the use of the external view finder, you cannot use both at the same time. NO AF assist illumination which makes shooting photos at night or in low light difficult. Oly should get hint on the Panasonic GF-1. IMHO Oly made a disappointing move, they should have just call it the E-P1x, or E-P1R but that’s not the usual Olympus naming method. I just hope that they come up with something really good in the next E-P3 not just small update they did in the new E-P1.

The Olympus E-P2 is available in black and will be available by January 2010 at around $1,100. Kits include, the E-P2 Body with ED 14-42mm f3.5/5.6 Zuiko Digital Zoom Lens +  EVF and

E-P2 Body with 17mm f2.8 Zuiko Digital Zoom Lens + EVF both at the same price.

Photos of the Olympus E-P2

More Photo’s on DPreview.com
via Olympus America

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