Olympus Evolt E420 Digital SLR Camera

I buy two or three cameras a year. I hesitated on this camera because it has no image stabilization. But I recently took it to Europe and got great pictures in churches and museums. I set the ISO to 800 and had very sharp handheld pictures. The size is fantastic...very light and small. The live view works great...although the focus is slow. Focus if very fast in non-live view. To learn all the options, you'd have to spend quite a bit of time. But for most uses, you can learn to use the camera in about 5 minutes. Menus are very deep, so some options are difficult to keep track of. But in most competitors at this price level, those deep menued options don't even exist. Highly recommended.

I've had this camera for a couple of months now and I am nothing short of satisfied with this camera's look, feel, size and quality. For starters, this camera is really small! I always knew that it was touted as the world's smallest, but it really is that tiny! If used along with the pancake lens, this camera can be carried around all day in your jacket/coat pocket and will make an excellent tool for street photography. I also own an E-510 and other than the missing IS, I would say this camera has improved a lot over the E-x10 series. For starters, the JPEG engine and the new sensor are a noticeable improvement and this shows in the image quality. The camera also has a much better dynamic range and doesn't clip highlights like the E-510, which makes it very easy to use. The auto WB isn't as accurate as the E-510 though and it does have a tendency to make colors a little warmer, but this still looks really nice and isn't really a problem. Noise is also very well controlled and eve... Read more

It's my first SLR, and I couldn't be happier with it. I hesitated for a long time because I was worried that I wouldn't take the camera everywhere the way I did with my point and shoot. But it's small, light and just as easy to tote everyplace. The lenses are also much smaller and lighter, but with the same quality shots. And it takes simply beautiful pictures. The price wasn't so high that I had to hock my first born for it either, which was the other barrier holding me back.

I have fallen in love with the Olympus E-420 and the two prime lenses, the 25mm pancake and the 50mm f2.0. After many years of photography, going all the way back to the sixties, my nostalgia for certain elements of the old ways has been satisfied by this camera. The compact size, the light weight, the prime lenses, the high quality and the ability to shoot with the feeling that the camera and I are one -- all are quite wonderful. The pancake lens is so comfortable and convenient, I am quite willing to overcome its lack of perfection -- it's more than good enough. And the 50mm is for me the sharpest lens, with some of the most beautiful images that I have had in many yearsOlympus Evolt E420 10MP Digital SLR Camera with 25mm f/2.8 Pancake Zuiko Lens. And, peculiarly, I am thrilled that this camera focuses so dependably. I've used lots of Nikons and Canons. In recent years, I've suffered a lot from erratic focusing, mostly with the Canon DSLRs. The confidence I feel with the e-42... Read more

I purchased this camera in hopes of replacing my point and shoot. In the past, I have just missed too many shots because my point and shoot was too slow, or because it focused on the wrong object, or just had the wrong exposure. So I was looking for small DSLR, and when this camera came out with the pancake lens, I wanted to give it a try. My personal experience has been with a few different kinds of cameras, Canon A2, Yashica T4, Canon S100, Canon Digital Rebel, and a Minolta G500. I rated this camera as a single unit consisting of the body and the 25mm f/2.8 pancake lens. My tests have taken about 3 weeks and include two family vacations. Quality of the images (not including user error): 5/5 Ease of Use: 4/5 Feel: 5/5 Live View mode: 2/5 Advanced modes, Manual Mode, and manual focus: 3/5 Fun: 5/5 Ease of use for handing to others: 5/5 Speed of use (not including Live View): 5/5 Overall: 4/5 Strengths: First off, the camera feels great. Even though it is small, it... Read more