Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 40-150 mm F2.8 PRO Lens, Telephoto Zoom, Suitable for All MFT Cameras (Olympus OM-D & PEN Models, Panasonic G Series), Black

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Finally, there is the MC-14 1.4x teleconverter, the first developed for MFT lenses. It is relatively flat (14.7mm) so using it won’t affect the size of your system. It features a very similar build quality to the lens with an all-metal finish. The front lens protrudes from the converter, a design that will limit its compatibility to the Olympus 40-150mm and upcoming 300mm f/4. It won’t work with other MFT telephoto lenses. Splashproof type: IEC Standard publication 60529 IP53 (applies when the lens is used with OM System (Olympus) splash proof body). Dustproof construction The 40-150mm has one L-Fn button that is programmable on the Olympus camera bodies. The zoom positions are marked at 40, 50, 70, 100, and 150mm, and the zoom rotation is less than a quarter turn from minimum to maximum. Overall, I can’t find anything to really dislike about the handling of this lens. Yeah, a few more focus markings and a few additional focus related choices of what to program in the L.Fn button would be nice. Still, I can’t imagine a lens that would handle much better than this one. The colors coming from this lens were consistent with what I’d expect from the E-M1 Mark III. Colors are a more neutral starting point, without being overly saturated or taking on other tones. Colors and contrast will naturally look a bit more washed out when lens flare is captured. Extra Image Samples

But, while many manufacturers will label a lens as weather-sealed but not say exactly how much weather is too much, OM System has added an official IP rating to this lens. With an IP53, the optic is tested to withstand most dust, as well as jets of water up to a 60-degree angle. Following an initial day of testing at the Cheltenham horse races with Ken McMahon, Gordon sourced a second sample of the lens and tested it for a month in a wide variety of portrait, landscape and action environments. He also retested the lens with the Olympus ODM EM1 updated to firmware 2.2 which claims to deliver superior AF precision with the 40-150mm. Read on to find out if this is the telephoto zoom Micro Four Thirds owners have been waiting for. Olympus 40-150mm f2.8 Pro design and build quality Home » Olympus 40-150mm F2.8 Review – Better than Full Frame? Olympus 40-150mm F2.8 Review – Better than Full Frame?The blue column represents readings from the centre of the picture frame at the various apertures and the green is from the edges. Averaging them out gives the red weighted column. At 40mm sharpness is already outstanding in the centre of the frame at maximum aperture, although performance towards the edges falls behind somewhat, only reaching fairly good levels. Stopping down improves performance across the frame, with peak sharpness across the frame being achieved at f/5.6. Here clarity is outstanding in the centre, and very good towards the edges. But the thing is, how many high-performance, weather-sealed, and optically gorgeous 80-300mm F5.6 full-frame lenses are there? Of course, you can buy a similar sized 70-200mm F4 for your full-frame camera, but you lose a 100mm, the metal construction, and the dual-motor autofocus speed. Another alternative is the absurdly compact Nikon AF-S 300mm F4 PF. However, this excellent Nikon won’t zoom. Of course, such a lens does come with some built-in downsides. While it’s absurdly light for a zoom of its capabilities, it’s still a big heavy lens by most other measures. Therefore, its leave-at-home factor is higher than the smaller, less capable Olympus 40-150mm F4 Pro. And, of course, the Olympus 40-150mm F2.8 is one of Olympus’s more expensive lenses. The lens weights about 760g without the tripod mount, which is heavier than the E-M1 or any other MFT camera. I decided to use it with the E-M1 without the HLD-7 battery grip, not only to keep the combo as small as possible but also to see how the extra weight and size would affect the usability of a system known to be more compact than this. After carrying it around every day for my daily work for two weeks, I can say that in the end that the weight and size don’t make a huge difference, as the lens still fits nicely inside my primary camera bag, the Lowerpro Event Messenger 150. Yes, the lens is big but still compact enough for the zoom range it covers.

Olympus servicing includes a complete inspection of all functions and repair and/or replacement of all parts necessary to ensure your product meets factory specifications. Apochromatic lenses have special lens elements (aspheric, extra-low dispersion etc) to minimize the problem, hence they usually cost more. Although not the first M.ZUIKO Pro series lens to feature a dust, splash and freezeproof construction (this goes to the M.ZUIKO Digital ED 12-40mm f/2.8), it’s the first telephoto lens in the range that’s been made to withstand the severity of professional use. As for the “equivalency” goofiness regarding aperture, it is indeed a goofy stretch whereby “Fool Frame Fanatics” manage to convince people that you have to double the ƒ ratio of µ4/3rds lenses.The constant f2.8 aperture is maintained throughout the focal range, a very useful feature and not just for shooting in low light. The physical aperture diaphragm construction is composed of 9 blades which produce a circular shaped aperture that should result in pretty circular blob highlights for out of focus elements. At the other end of the range the minimum aperture is f22. Inside the 40-150mm f2.8 Pro there are 16 elements in 10 groups including ED, Super ED, EDA and HD elements. Essentially these technologies are designed to reduce internal light dispersion (ED stands for Extra-low dispersion, EDA is Extra-low Dispersion Aspheric and HD is High refractive index & Dispersion) and improve image quality and contrast. On the other hand, vignetting and linear distortion are just minimal, period. Minimal as in generally “ignorable.” I found the vignetting so low (perhaps a third of a stop at all focal lengths in the corners) that I had to retest and look at the results several times to make sure I wasn’t missing something. Vignetting is totally ignorable by f/4. Storm clouds and drizzle early in the day looked like the perfect conditions for putting the lens’s weather sealing to the test, but the sun broke through in true British fashion so we’ll just have to wait until our final review sample arrives (hopefully in the next few weeks) before we can subject it to a soaking and see how it performs in this respect. What I'd like to share with everyone is my experience with the new to me Olympus mZD 40-150mm f2.8 Pro + and MC-20 2x converter coming from owning and loving the Olympus ZD 50-200mm f2.8-3.5 ED (non-SWD) + EC-14. It's going to be a lengthy post / rolling review with a few images and may take a couple of days to add some things that I want to share. What I really want to highlight for others is what living with the 40-150 f2.8 is like with the MC-20 and what to expect. I welcome others with this lens + TC to add to my comments and let me know if that's what they have experienced as well. I'm no expert lens reviewer by any imagination and won't be posting shots of newspaper (though I've done that comparison and my real world shooting has confirmed it).