written by Ugo Baldassarre – translation by Giorgio Aprile
OM Digital Solution makes its first (double) move and launches two new products: the Zuiko Pro 8-25mm F/4 (a very versatile wide-angle lens with a handyman vocation) and a new camera. While waiting to receive the actual products for a test, I wanted to think about the new camera that I still had the opportunity to touch on June 9th directly at Olympus Italia with Luca Servadei (sales director) and Gianni Trevisani (chief technical officer of Olympus Italy).
The EP series was the one that launched the Olympus Micro4/3 system and has always been characterized by extreme elegance, constructive sturdiness, and well-defined choices; not to be confused with the Lite line which instead aimed at a similar but less sought-after result. Leaving aside the Pen F project (which I reproach precisely for not having been so extreme in some choices) no Pen has ever had the viewfinder and, if you think about it, the first EP1 did not even have the possibility of mounting the electronic one (optional) that was introduced by second model, the EP2.
The EP7 therefore seems to maintain a strong idea of continuity with the past, almost as if it were a “restart” of the glorious series that launched the system.
If you wanted to objectively analyse a product like this, the considerations to be made would be diametrically opposed to those that instead, as a lover of the brand and the system (I admit it candidly!), I will go and do. The specifications had been known for a few days; the final price was only announced yesterday but it was in the air. Too expensive: the inexorable and prejudiced verdict of the web that speaks without reflecting.
The Pen EP 7 is, in my opinion, first an “object” and then a “photographic instrument”. An object of refined workmanship and extreme beauty – I add – after holding it in your hand and feeling it between your fingers. Aluminium – where plastic was expected – perfectly allocated controls and an ingenious switch on the front that mimics that of the F but is even more comfortable, switching in real time with a click from black and white to colour and activating with all the related commands the control of black and white and colour filters.
Solidity, robustness, feeling. These are the first three things that came to my mind, but always and only after having first exclaimed “WOW: it’s beautiful”.
And when a product manages to start with this step, when it conquers you like this, the price is only an obstacle that separates from the pleasure of possession, no longer something rational. A bit like it happens for any “luxury” product.
The EP7 restarts where the EP5 left off, years ago: high-level construction camera and features like the flagship in a compact body designed for point & shoot and extremely stylish. This is the recipe, and this is what is served.
If you want the viewfinder, there is the OM-10 Mark IV; if you want an adjustable display there is the PEN F or the Em5 mark 3 etc. etc.: none of these, however, is the EP7 which is therefore designed and built to be unique.
The shooting experience that Olympus / OM-Digital Solution wants to offer with this product is well defined.
Could a pop-up viewfinder fit in? Certainly, and also perfectly!! It would not have affected the aesthetics and would probably have been more useful than the small integrated flash but – and I stress but – it would probably have affected the product concept: in Olympus they have always been like this, in many ways close to certain choices of Leica’s Germans.
Personally, I loved the EP2 and EP5, always used without a viewfinder and enjoyed in their original form, just as they were designed and built.
On the other hand, the very young people who have learned to shoot with their smartphone and who, grown up, are looking for advanced products for a superior photographic experience, do not even conceive the viewfinder: I believe this is the focal point of the reasoning behind this camera. Offer a superior shooting experience to those accustomed to simple point & click.
And, I believe, the message of “passage” that this product carries with it is also strong, as it is the first product of the new company course: a cross-over product, of generational passage.
Besides, what are we complaining about? There is no shortage of alternatives.
In the next few days I will have the opportunity to really test the camera, on the field, but I firmly believe that, if taken and used without prejudice, understood in its essence, and enjoyed in its exemplary beauty, the EP7 will only make you fall in love, as it has happened to me, of what it represents and not just of what it can do. It is a “tiny camera” that makes the heart beat.
It was enough for me to take it in hand to long for one!
Thanks to Polyphoto S.p.A. for their collaboration.
For more information on Pen E-P7 click here – official site
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