My Pen F has become the no work only play camera.

Several reasons, but it mostly comes down to practicality. The Pen has a great vibe as a personal, immersive camera, but a poor handling dynamic for on the go, working for someone else, pro work.

It has in it’s corner;

• Possibly the best base IQ of any of my cameras at lower ISO’s (100-800).

• Very usable JPEG’s, but I only use them as a preview (especially the mono ones)

• Great weight and solidity.

• An off-set view finder and a rear screen that just begs to be turn inward (looks nice, feels right).

• Nice looks that don’t scream “pro at work”, more enthusiast at play.

• Great manual focus handling.

What it does not offer:

• Great high ISO performance (on par with EM10 mk2). Like the EM5 mk1 the noise is tight, like good film grain, but at higher ISO’s the images just lose something.

• Tracking AF. None to be had. AF is snappy, but useless for sports.

• High ISO silent shutter (regularly bands at 1600).

• Any similarity to any other camera I use, so switching mid job can be troublesome.

• A separate battery and card slot.

• Any consistency with batteries or accessories to my work horse cameras.

• Nice shutter sound. In vertical mode it sounds “flappy”.

The little kit I tend to carry around with it consists of my spare 45 F1.8, the under used 17 f1.8 and my “just in case” 40-150 kit/junk tele.

The tele gets used more than I would have predicted, but the handling combination of the heavy, all metal Pen and super light plastic zoom is far from re-assuring. I see visible wobble, something I am not accustomed to. It is effectively the opposite dynamic to my 300 on the EM1x, which feels (and is) solid as a rock.

Looks though, can be deceptive.

I expect great results from my 17 and 45. Both seem perfectly designed for (or the other way around) the Pen. The kit lens just feels like a wind cup up front, but the results I get are consistently good.