A reader commentary on the Guide to EM-1 supplement to Oly manual

[GerrySiegel]

For what it is worth. Data for all who are still learning the flagship model menu and dial structure: (An Amazon

review among many:

 

To wit:

 

"3.0 out of 5 stars A Good Book. The next edition will be better., August 31, 2014"

 

By

Robert Felice (Monterey Peninsula) -

(REAL NAME)

Verified Purchase

 

This review is from: David Busch's Olympus OM-D E-M1 Guide to Digital Photography (Paperback)----text of review follows:

 

"This is a pretty good book; I learned a lot from it. And at the moment, it is the only book available for the EM-1.

 

The book is far from perfect, however. It could have been so much better.

 

I have two main gripes with the book; the first concerns the writing style. In my opinion, the book wasn't

written, as much as it was dictated. There is a difference, as you may know, between speaking and writing -- when

you talk, you use more interjections, as thoughts pop into your heard and you attempt to get them out. Listeners

are not readers, so it is not surprising that readers have trouble parsing the pauses that come between spoken

phrases, just as you, dear reader, are stumbling over these past few sentences.

 

The book really needed a pair of editors: one to organize the stream-of-consciousness writing style, and one to

check and correct all of the technical details. Here's a sample of the writing I wish someone had flagged for

rewriting: "The Olympus Viewer 3 software also offers a RAW format editing palette designed to take advantage of

all the RAW file can offer (see Figure 3.16). Here you can apply non-destructive editing tweaks and take full

advantage of what the format has to offer. One of the best things about RAW format is the ability to take

advantage of all the information the format contains."

 

My second gripe concerns the way the information is presented. A lot of it was copied-and-pasted from David's

other books. This was not necessarily a bad thing: most camera books are going to have a lot of common

information, and copying-and-pasting general material from one book to another is a fine way to work smarter

without working harder.

 

Problems arise, however, when you are lazy and don't check the information you are copying to make sure it is

appropriate for the new book. Specifically, information that only pertains to a DSLR camera has no place in a

mirrorless camera book. Since the EM-1 is a mirrorless camera, any copied material needs to be inspected and

possibly modified before it is included.

 

Despite my gripes, I am grateful to David and Dan for writing this book. The OM-D EM-1 is a very complicated

camera, and the authors did a pretty good job of explaining all of its features. I just wish the technical editor

had done a better job so I hadn't found so many errors. My list follows:

 

Page 16 Step 2

"Press the down arrow and rotate the front dial (near the shutter release button on the top of the camera) once

to the left to highlight the Setup menu."

You have to press the down arrow 5 times to reach the Setup menu (but since the Setup menu is the last item in

the list, you could also press the up arrow once, which would be a lot quicker). You can also navigate to a menu

by rotating the rear dial, which would be faster than repeatedly pressing the down arrow.

 

Page 33 Choosing a Metering Mode

"(You can also use the super control screen, described later, to select a metering mode)."

The super control screen was described earlier (on page 29), not later.

 

Page 32, Figure 2.11

"Metering Modes (top: left to right): Evaluative, Partial, Spot, Center-weighted"

This appears to be a Copy-And-Paste Error (CAPE). Canon DSLRs use the above mentioned metering modes. The EM-1's

metering modes are Digital ESP metering, Center weighted averaging metering, Spot metering, Spot

metering-Highlight, and Spot metering-Shadow.

 

Page 33 Using the Self-Timer

"Press the drive/button..."

Typo: this should be "drive button". Actually, the button is described on page 52 as the Sequential

Shooting/Timer/HDR button. Olympus calls it the Sequential Shooting/Self-Timer/HDR button, and avoids the term

Drive button (which I believe is used with Canon cameras.)

 

Page 37 Figure 2.13

A recent software update added 1 second Anti-Shock, 2 second Anti-Shock, 12 second Anti-Shock, and Anti-Shock

options. The book is aware of the update (see, for example, page 354, Official Firmware).

 

Page 42

Step 4. After turning the camera on, the camera displays a menu, consisting of Storage, MTP, Print, or Exit (the

camera can be set to default to one of these via Menu D, USB Menu). For most applications, select Storage and

press the OK button. For or Windows Vista, Windows 7 or Windows 8 Windows Photo Gallery, select MTP and press the

OK button.

 

Page 42

Figure 2.18

The "USB port" label actually identifies the HDMI port. The label should actually read "multi-connector" and

should point to the lower port.

 

Page 51 Arrow Keys - Touch Screen Lock

The text describes the White Balance function.

If you assign the Touch Screen Lock function to an arrow key, when the arrow key is pressed, the touch panel

toggles between enabled and disabled.

 

Page 54 Underneath Your EM-1

No mention of the battery compartment, although it is called out in the figure.

 

Page 66 Green sidebar

"...and exploring some advanced techniques like trap focus..."

CAPE: The book does not mention of trap focus, which is a DSLR feature, and not supported by the EM-1.

 

Page 66 Green sidebar

"...stacked focus..."

CAPE: The EM-1 does not support stacked focus. Although Davie explains Focus Stacking on page 130, in the example

he had to manually set the focus. I was actually disappointed to discover that the EM-1 does not support focus

stacking, a feature that Canon included in my S-95 point-and-shoot.

 

Page 69 Getting a handle of Exposure

The images in Figure 4.2 are stacked left and right, not top and bottom.

 

Page 72 F/Stops and Shutter Speeds

"...and I realize that many soon-to-be-ambitious photographer do purchase the E-M1 as their first digital SLR)..."

CAPE: the EM-1 is a MILC (mirrorless interchangeable lens camera), not an DSLR (digital single lens reflex).

 

Page 71 How the Olympus E-M1 Calculates Exposure

"...and is bounced up by the mirror to sensors located near the focusing surface..."

CAPE: since the EM-1 is a mirrorless interchangeable lens camera, it does not have a mirror.

 

Page 77 Choosing a Metering Method

Hi Spot should be Spot metering-highlight.

Shadow Spot should be Spot metering-shadow.

 

Page 118 Focus Modes

"...or use some other control, such as the AF-ON button)...

CAPE: Nikon cameras have an AF-ON button, but the EM-1 does not.

 

Page 118 Focus Modes

"The E-M1 has five focus modes..."

Four of the five focus modes are abbreviated, but only two are spelled out. The unspecified focus modes are:

S-AF+MF: Simultaneous Single-AF and Manual Focus

C-AF+TR: Continuous AF and Tracking

 

Page 118 Focus Modes

"There are several ways to reach the focus modes menu. The fastest and easiest is to press the AF button, just to

the left of the On/Off switch. Make sure the lever to the right of the AEL/AFL button in in the 1 position."

TIP: You can set the camera so that pressing the AF button takes you to the Focus mode menu regardless of the

position of the lever: Custom Menu | B Button/Dial/Lever | 2+ [split button] | OFF. This also affects the

operation of the Shooting/Self-timer/HDR button as well.

When set to OFF, pressing the AF/Metering Flash/Flash Compensation button will always take you to the Auto Focus

Metering, regardless of the position of the lever. However, with this setting you will not be able to access the

Flash Intensity control or the Flash menu by pressing the AF button.

 

Page 121 Manual Focus

"You can also use manual focusing, by choosing the Single AF+MF mode."

Ignoring the extraneous comma, the way to access Manual Focus is to choose MF (Single AF+MF was covered on page 120).

 

Page 128 Setting the AF Target Type

"If you want to change from the camera's default 81 AF Target grid setup, then access the grid from the super

control panel."

TIP: You can also access the grid by pressing the Fn1 button (assuming you haven't remapped it to another function).

 

Page 129 Setting the Face Priority Control

"If you need to change this option often, you might consider setting the Fn1 button (or any of the other user

designable buttons) to AF Area Select."

The default assignment for the Fn1 button displays the AF Area.

 

Page 135 Movies and Live View

IMO, the title should be "Live View and Movies," because that is the order of presentation.

 

Page 136 Live View Essentials

Shoot from tripod or hand-held: "If you want to use live view for hand-held images, us an image-stabilized lens

and/or a high shutter speed."

CAPE: The EM-1 has 5-axis image stabilization with automatic panning detection, so image-stabilized lenses are

unnecessary. To be fair, a telephoto image-stabilized lens might do a better job of reducing shake than the

camera. But in general, one of the advantages of a camera with like the EM-1 with built-in image stabilization is

that you don't need to pay extra for image-stabilized lenses.

 

Page 141 Resolution and Frame Rates

1) The book mentions the maximum "shooting time" on a 16GB memory card for 1920 x 1080 resolution and 640 x 480,

but omits the figure for 1280 x 720 resolution.

2)The number of minutes at 640 x 480 is specified at "more than 3 hours" here on page 141, but at the bottom of

page 142 the number for the same resolution drops to 92 minutes. One of these numbers is not correct.

 

Page 144 Depth-of-Field and Video

"As I mentioned, the producers of Saturday Night Live could afford to have Alex Buono, their director of

photography, use the niftiest, most expensive high-resolution video cameras to shoot the opening sequences of the

program."

I could find no mention of Alex Buono, or Saturday Night Live anywhere in the chapter.

 

Page 156 Use an external microphone

"The external microphone port can provide plug-in power for microphones that can take their power from this sort

of outlet rather than from a battery in the microphone."

Appears to be another CAPE: According to DP Review, "he E-M1 does NOT provide any power via the mic jack".

http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/53021535

 

Page 160 Continuous Shooting

"To use the EM-1's Continuous shooting mode, press the camera's drive button or navigate to the continuous

shooting icon on the super control panel. When you partially depress the shutter button, the viewfinder will

display a number representing the maximum number of shots you can take at the current quality settings."

CAPE 1: The EM-1 does not have a continuous shooting mode.

The Em-1 does have Sequential High and Sequential Low modes. In these modes, the camera takes about 10 and 6.5

pictures per second, respectively (you can change the number of pictures via Custom Menu C, H fps and L fps).

CAPE 2: The viewfinder does not display the number of maximum number of shots you can take, regardless of the

shooting mode. The EM-1 manual, Chapter 5, Basic operations, page 35, details the information displayed by the

viewfinder and does not show number of shots you can take, only the number of shots you can store on the memory card.

 

Page 162 Don't combine high shutter speeds with electronic flash

"That's the fastest speed at which the camper's focal plane shutter is fully open: at shorter speeds, the "slit"

described above comes into play, so that the flash will expose only the small portion of the sensor exposed by

the slit during its duration."

The "slit" is not described until chapter 11, How Electronic Flash Works.

 

Page 166 Timed exposures

Anther CAPE. The lists of preset shutter speeds are wrong. On the EM-1, the shutter speeds do not vary with

exposure adjustment increments.

In Shutter-priority mode, the available shutter speeds are: 1/8000, 1/6400, 1/5000, 1/4000, 1/3200, 1/2500,

1/2000, 1/1600, 1/1250, 1/1000, 1/800, 1/640, 1/500, 1/400, 1/320, 1/250, 1/200, 1/160. 1/125, 1/100, 1/80, 1/60,

1/50, 1/40, 1/30, 1/25, 1/20, 1/15, 1/13, 1/10, 1/8, 16, 1/5, 1/4, 1/3, 1/2.5, 1/2, 1/1.6, 1/1.3, 1", 1.3", 1.6",

2:, 2.5", 3.2", 4", 5", 6", 8", 10", 13", 15", 20", 25", 30", 40", 50", 60".

In Manual mode the same shutter speeds are available, plus Live Bulb and Live Time.

 

Page 171 Self-Timer

"Activate the timer by pressing the Drive/HDR button and press the left arrow key until the drive modes appear on

the LCD status panel."

1: The book consistently refers to the Sequential Shooting/Timer/HDR button as the Drive button or the Drive/HDR

button, even though the button in correctly identified on page 52. Make sure the lever is in position 1, then

press the Sequential Shooting/Timer/HDR button. Next, press either the left or right arrow button or rotate the

rear dial left or right to select the self-timer settings (Self-timer 12 SEC, Self-timer 2 SEC, or Self-timer

Custom) from the sequential shooting/self-timer menu.

The settings are displayed on the Electronic View Finder or the Monitor. The book variously refers to the display

on the rear of the camera as the touch screen, the LCD, the LCD monitor, or the LCD status panel, but Olympus

refers to it as the Monitor. Some DSLRS have an LCD status panel on the top of the camera body, where the drive

mode settings might be displayed, which temps me to mark this as a CAPE.

2: You can also access the sequential shooting/self-timer menu from the super control panel.

 

Page 172 Wi-Fi and Geotagging

"Wireless capabilities allow you to upload photos directly from your E-M1 to your computer..."

Strictly speaking, the sentence is true: you can use wireless technology to upload photos directly from a camera

to your computer. However, the EM-1 does not currently support that capability. As the book states on page 367 in

Chapter 15, "Note that the camper's wireless functions can't be used with a home Wi-Fi network..."

 

Page 181 Anatomy of the E-M1's Menus

"Within the menu choices, you can scroll up or down with the touch screen or arrow keys; choose SET to select the

choice you've made..."

The SET function is mapped to the OK button, so it would be clearer just to say that you press the OK button to

select the choice you've made.

 

Page 181 Shooting Menu Options

Drive Mode should be Sequential shooting/Self-timer/HDR.

 

Page 183 Storing Myset Settings

Step 1 "I'll provide some suggested setups later".

I could not find any.

 

Page 220 Setting AEL/AFL Behavior

"The table provided in the Olympus manual can be a little confusing, so I'm going to clear things up with a

little color coding."

None of the tables in this section are color coded. Perhaps this was a printing error?

 

Page 224 L-Fn1 Button

"If nothing else, it's a nice choice for a depth-of-field preview button (which Olympus identifies as "Preview"),

since the camera doesn't come with one."

The EM-1 has a depth-of-field preview button on the front of the camera body; see Figure 3.1 on page 45.

 

Page 226 Release Priority

Rls Priority S: "Because C-AF focuses and refocuses constantly when autofocus is active, you may find that an

image is not quite in sharpest focus."

This section is about S-AF; any information about C-AF belongs in the next section, Rls Priority C.

 

Page 227Rlease Lag-Time

"This option will let you elect a shorter lag. (For the life of me, I have no idea why Olympus thought someone

might want a longer lag time)."

The manual warns you on Page 92 that this setting "will shorten the battery life."

 

Page 252 But Don't Forget the Crop Factor

"The outer rectangle, marked 1X, shows the field of view you might expect with a 28mm lens mounted on a so-called

"full-frame" model, while the area marked 1.65 shows the field of view you'd get with that 28mm lens installed on

a typical entry-level dSLR."

1: Typo: "dSLR" should be "DSLR".

2: In Figure 10.1, the area is marked 1.5X; it should be 1.6X

 

Page 255 Olympus 14-42mm f/3.5-5.6 autofocus lens.

"This one, prices at about $300, is light, compact (you can see it mounted on the E-M1 in Figure 10.3)..."

The lens in Figure 10.3 is not mounted on a camera. However, I believe in the picture on the front cover shows it

mounted on the camera.

 

Page 246 Firmware Version

"If you want to update to a new firmware version for either the camera of a lens, press the SET button to select

which type of firmware you want to upgrade. then insert a memory card containing the binary file, and press the

SET button to begin the process."

More CAPES.

1: The EM-1 does not have a SET button.

2: You update he EM-1 Firmware using the OLYMPUS Digital Camera Updater and a USB cable, not by copying the

firmware to a memory card.

 

Page 289 Fluorescent Light/Other Light Sources

"Worse, fluorescent lamps have a discontinuous spectrum of light that can have some colors missing entirely,

producing that substandard Color Rendering Index I mentioned."

This is the first mention of the Color Rendering Index. The concept is described in the next section, Adjusting

White Balance.

 

Page 289 Adjusting White Balance

"I showed you how to adjust white balance bracketing in Chapter 4 (there's more in Chapter 8, too).

There is nothing on adjusting white balance bracketing in Chapter 4. Chapter 4 does mention Chapter 8, which does

explain white balance bracketing.

 

Page 293 How Electronic Flash Works

"As I mentioned earlier in this book, the E-M1 has a vertically traveling shutter that consists of two curtains."

The book mentioned "the slit" on page 162, but did not describe it there. This is the first time curtains have

been mentioned in the book.

 

Page 301 More on Flash Control Settings

"I introduced the super control panel's Flash Control settings in Chapter 8."

I could not find anything on the Flash Control settings in Chapter 8. The super control panel, introduced in

Chapter 2, mentions flash settings, but does not describe them. The flash mode settings were actually introduced

earlier in Chapter 11, starting on page 294.

 

Page 301 More on Flash Control Settings

"This menu includes a variety of options depending on what exposure mode you're shooting in (see Figure 11.14)..."

1: Figure 11.4 does not show the Flash Control menu; it is a duplicate of Figure 11.16, the external flash

function setting menu.

2: To access the Flash Control settings, either move the lever to position 2 and press the AF button; or press OK

to access the super control panel, then press the [lightning bolt]AUTO icon.

 

Page 302 Flash Sync Speed in AV Mode

Another CAPE. AV (or Av) mode is the name Canon uses for Aperture-priority mode. Olympus calls it A mode on the EM-1.

 

Page 304 External Flash Function Settings

"You can access this menu only when you have a compatible electronic flash attached and switched on."

You can access the menu at any time, with or without a flash unit attached. First go to Shooting Menu 2, RC Mode,

and make sure the value is set to ON. Exit the menu and press the OK button. If the External Flash Function

Setting menu does not appear, press the INFO button until it does.

 

Page 306 When using fill flash with Aperture-priority

"The difficulties of using selective focus with fill flash, mentioned earlier, become particularly acute when you

switch to Av exposure mode."

Another CAPE. This should be "A", not "Av".

 

Page 308 Using External Electronic Flash

"(Non dedicated flash units, such as studio flash, can be connected using the camera's PC terminal.)"

Typo. "PC terminal" should be "PC/X connector" (see page 45).

 

Page 315 Snoots and Barn Doors

The book does not include a picture of a snoot, but you can find pictures of them in the Amazon camera department.

 

Page 340 Direct Printing from the Camera

Step 2 "...and plug the supplied cable into the A/V Out/Digital port."

Another CAPE. The EM-1 has a multi-connector port, not an A/V Out/Digital port; see page 47.

 

Page 342 Direct Print Order Format (DPOF) Printing

Step 1 "...navigate to the print icon."

There is no print icon. The menu item is "Print Order".

Missing step 1A: In the Print order menu, choose the Picture icon, or the Picture-All icon and press OK.

 

Page 343 Digital Camera Updater

"You can check the Olympus software support web page to see if there's a recent update for you r camera (there

weren't during the time this book was written)..."

The most recent update for the camera when the book was written was 1.4, as mentioned on page 246, Firmware.

 

Page 355 Getting Started

"For example, the loader software isn't set up to go hunting through your memory card for the firmware file. It

only looks in the root directory of your card..."

Anther CAPE. Updates are applied using the OLYMPUS Digital Camera Updater and a USB cable, not by copying the

firmware to a memory card.

 

Page 355 Getting Started

Step 4: "If you want to know what the firmware update will do, select the update and click on the Details button."

Another CAPE. There is no Details button, as Figure 14.2 clearly shows.

 

Page 355 Getting Started

Step 5: The next screen asks you to confirm you want to update your firmware."

Another CAPE: The next screen contains instructions for monitoring the update process and tells you not to click

the Next button until the camera displays OK

 

Page 357 Getting Started

Step 6: CAPE, does not apply to the Olympus update process.

 

Page 357 Getting Started

Step 7: CAPE, does not apply to the Olympus update process.

 

Page 360 What Can You Do?

"If you've set the camera in the Shoot w/o Card has been turned on..."

Another CAPE: On the EM-1, "Shoot w/o Card" is called "Test Picture".

Actually, it's difficult to shoot on an EM-1 without a memory card and not be aware of it: the top of the Monitor

displays "No Card" in white letters on a dark background if you do.

 

Page 361 Cleaning Your Sensor

"...eventually making its way inside your camera to settle in the mirror chamber. As you take photos, the mirror

flipping up and down causes the dust to become airborne and eventually make its way past the shutter curtain to

come to rest on the anti-aliasing filter atop your sensor."

Another CAPE: The EM-1 does not have a mirror.

And one more CAPE: And according to Robin Wong, the EM_1 sensor does not have an anti-aliasing filter.

http://robinwong.blogspot.com/2013/09/olympus-om-d-e-m1-review-introduction.html

 

Pg 370 Using the Olympus Image Share App

Olympus has made some significant changes to the app since the book was written. Check the book's website for

possible updates.

 

Page 373 Remote Control

Display Count Indicator for Self-Timer: "Attach the image to an email, upload it to Facebook, or Tweet it via

this option."

The text is irrelevant. The choices are ON and OFF.

 

If you've made it this far, you deserve a treat: John Foster has done a spectacular job of explaining the myriad

menu settings in the EM-1, as well as suggesting which options to change and why. A Google search for "john

foster em-1 camera setup" will take you to his "OM-D E-M1 how to setup, configure and customize your camera"

page, which I strongly suggest you bookmark.

Help other customers find the most helpful reviews "

 

_____________________

 

I have not checked out subject 'errata " yet but I have printed it out and tucked into the book.....am using Foster guide to menu system and it is helpful some.

 

 

[harold_gough]

<p>On page 263 it says:<br>

"Page 142 of the English language instruction manual (PDF version) has a nice multi-page table showing what gets reset in each mode, and what can be saved in the Mysets. In the interest of brevity, I’m not going to repeat that information here because the summary above should suffice and be easier to remember."<br>

Not in my copy (PDFv2)</p>

[GerrySiegel]

The author has a blog wherein he lists some of the corrections that have been found in his EM-1 book. Perhaps we should just look at this like a bug in the software, and maybe there is logic in buying books on Kindle. With online upgrades weekly.....hmmm.....still awaiting the definitive guide to the camera, just as Minolta when introducing the complicated FlashMeter IV then put out a supplement to try to simplify their owner's manual. I know, ask your kids to sort it out for you...:-)

 

http://olympusguides.com/?page_id=10