Hi Matic goes up against the PEN

<p>I have recently acquired an E-PL3 and have been shooting away. As luck would have it, I found myself at the exact same location where 3 years earlier I had shot a few pictures with my Minolta Hi Matic E. I could not duplicate exactly the same conditions, season, sun angle or even the focal length, but the comparison is still interesting. I am curious what you think. We have the same scene captured by two cameras 40+ year old apart. </p>

<p>Minolta</p>

<p><img src="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/415093/35340006.jpg" alt="" /></p>

<p>Olympus</p>

<p><img src="https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/415093/P9130125.jpg" alt="" /></p>

 

<p>One thing in particular I've always liked about Olympus digicams is the option for very neutral, moderate contrast/saturation color photos. It closely resembles my favorite films like Reala.</p>

<p>BTW, you can adjust the color a bit even with the entry level Olympus JPEG-only digicams by tweaking the white balance a bit. For late afternoon daylight I'd probably choose daylight rather than auto white balance, to get the slightly desaturated greens and slightly boosted reds/oranges, which are typical of daylight balanced color films when used outside their peak middday sun color temperature range.</p>

<p>Another trick to emulating the look of color negative film prints with digital is to cut back on the sharpening. The default in-camera sharpening (and default for some raw editing settings) is a bit higher than we were accustomed to seeing with prints from color negative films decades ago.</p>

<p>I have not tweaked the Olympus. Just set it on P and shoot. It is true that the second picture was taken in late afternoon but the colors are nowhere near accurate. Beyond colors, which one appears sharper? I see more of the rock formations in the Minolta pic although that could be due to the sun angle. It is interesting that the little boat with the blue tarp is still there.</p>

<p>I wouldn't venture a guess about sharpness in small JPEGs. Both look about the same to me. The smallest meaningful detail I can see that's common to both is the gabled windows, and both appear about the same to me.</p>

<p>I quit picking nits years ago when I could no longer tell the differences between my Reala, Kodak Gold and 400UC prints at 4x6 and my snaps from an Olympus C-3040Z and D2H (both relatively low resolution by current standards, under 5 meagerpixels each). The only significant differences I could see were in the Fuji's distinctively punchier greens, and the punchy reds of 400UC - both easily mimicked with digital editing. In fact, Ricoh's "positive film" image setting for the GRD is a dead ringer for 400UC, despite supposedly being intended to emulate color slide film.</p>

<p>Both look sharp to me, but I'm actually more interested in the color. The shot from the Minolta has great color and seems to capture the water, sky, and clouds very nicely. Of course, the times of day make a difference too and I don't know if the Minolta was used in the morning or late afternoon like the Oly shot. The warmth of the Oly shot is nice though, but was it that warm in appearance or is that just how the Oly processor produced the image? I have an 'old' (2005) 4mp Olympus digital compact that takes surprisingly nice photos, but they have a very warm cast to them, warmer than any of my Canons, and I always considered Canon images to be very warm. I love my digital gear, make no mistake, but it always warms my heart to see the older film cameras hold their own against the newer cameras!</p>

<p>Ooooo, a film vs. digital thread (yes it is), how exciting! Photo.net: the last bastion of wooden ships and iron men.</p>