Olympus Pen EP1 underwater settings

[wayne007]

Does anyone know how to set the Olympus EP1 for underwater? The housing manual says that it has modes specific to underwater. They refer to the modes as "OLYMPUS PEN E-PL1's Underwater Macro and Underwater Wide shooting mode". It states that in these modes natural colors of the underwater are accurately reproduced". It refers to the manual page80 but there is nothing specific regarding underwater. Any ideas?

Wayne

 

[nikitich]

Set camera to A S or P mode. Go to settings Button Set FN Button (my menu is not in english so the names are not exact) then you can sing UW modes for that button. Every time you hit it it would change from UW macro (1 fish) to UW wide (3 fish). One of the main differences between these modes is aperture limits so if you shoot macro in UW wide you will get small aperture and shallow DOF.

 

[wayne007]

Wow! Where did you ever find that? Maybe you ought to write the manual for Olympus.
Thanks a lot that really helps!

Wayne

 

[J-u-n-i-o-R]

Hi
Wich housing are you guys uising?
Thks

 

[nikitich]

waiting for 10 bar to arrive. 20mm lens port. Panasonic 20mm - much faster focus compared to kit 14-42 + 67mm thread for macro lens

 

[decimal86]

hi

i am so glad i caught this thread. i am getting one but with Olympus PT-EP01 casing. you mean i should get a pana 20mm MFT lens instead? thks.

and if i were to use a telephoto for land use, which lens would u recomm? thks

 

[PHIL RUDIN]

While I would agree that the Pany 20 mm has excellent speed and image quality, it lacks the 1:1 ability of the Pany 45 macro lens and would fall short for wide angle use due to its 57 degree angle of view. With the standard PT-EP01 lens port the 20 and the Olympus 17 mm will both vignette because they sit so far back in the port. The 14 to 42, "kit" zoom will cover a much wider range and allow you to learn far more about U/W photography. For speed and image quality the 9 to 18 mm zoom is also a fine lens but needs the ZEN U/W PEN dome.

Phil Rudin

 

[nikitich]

hi

i am so glad i caught this thread. i am getting one but with Olympus PT-EP01 casing. you mean i should get a pana 20mm MFT lens instead?

I got 20mm with a specific port for this lens (10 bar housing). It probably will not work in Oly housing as PHIL RUDIN said due to vignetting. With Oly housing you probably will have to use a kit 14-42 zoom. Panasonic 14-45 is much faster but I am not sure how it would fit in the port and there are no gears for it.

 

[jhelmuth]

While I would agree that the Pany 20 mm has excellent speed and image quality, it lacks the 1:1 ability of the Pany 45 macro lens and would fall short for wide angle use due to its 57 degree angle of view. With the standard PT-EP01 lens port the 20 and the Olympus 17 mm will both vignette because they sit so far back in the port. The 14 to 42, "kit" zoom will cover a much wider range and allow you to learn far more about U/W photography. For speed and image quality the 9 to 18 mm zoom is also a fine lens but needs the ZEN U/W PEN dome.

Phil Rudin

Phil,

I bought the Zen WA100 from OpticalOcean and I do not yet have the 9-18mm m.Zuiko lens. Do you have any experience with the stock 14-42mm lens and the Zen dome port? Would you shoot the 14-42mm lense with the Zen - or the stock port?

Thanks in advance,

Jim

 

[PHIL RUDIN]

I am just getting started shooting the ZEN WA100 port with the M-9 to 18 zoom and I have not yet tried the Pany 7 to 14 or the 14 to 42 zoom. I would think the 14 to 42 would work very well, keep in mind that the dome will make both the wide and narrow ends of the lens wider. So far the dome is rendering sharp corners and it is very well made. I have used the Olympus 170 mm dome with the 4/3 9 to18 zoom on the Olympus E-3 DSLR and find the results from both domes to be equal.

The housing, camera, 9 to 18 zoom and gear with the Zen 100 dome are just slightly buoyant. With twin Inon Z-240 strobes, twin tray and eight inch arm sections the balance in salt water was as good as it gets. I could set the unit on the bottom without it drifting off in the current and still use it with one hand and have total control without fatigue to my wrist and forearm.

I have used the 9 to 18 and the 7 to 14 zooms underwater and have found the auto focus speed to be as good as with a DSLR. This is not the case with the Panasonic 45 macro which seems slow at best. The images are very high quality however and I am hoping the Olympus 50 macro when it arrives will be faster.

I am also using the Athena port adapter for the Olympus housing which allows the use of the Olympus, Athena and Inon ports for the Olympus, Seatool and Nexus DSLR housings. So far I have shot the 7 to 14 zoom with the 170 mm port and the 14 to 42 with the Athena port for the 35 mm macro DSLR lens.

The port adapter is well designed and has the same duel O-ring seals as the ZEN port and installes the same way. The ports then threat into the adapter and reduce the effort of making a port change. The adapter will retail for around $255.00 and may appeal to Olympus DSLR housing users who already own the 170 mm dome.

The ZEN WA100 port is by far the better choice if you don't already own the Olympus DSLR dome ports.

This Athena link, http://www.athena-opt.com/PT-EP01.html has additional details.

Phil Rudin