Grizzly bear, Denali National Park | OM-1 with Olympus 100-400mm lens
Many of you know that I purchased an OM Systems OM-1 body and lenses in April of this year. Now that I’ve had some time with the system, I wanted to share my experience using this camera. I’ve now used my OM System kit for travel, portraits, and wildlife photography, and I’ve been astonished by the results. Many of the concerns I had about this small format sensor are simply not issues when using today’s gear and software.
I recently presented a webinar on my personal experience with the Olympus OM-1 kit, and you can watch the replay below.
Here are some of my recommended kits for OM Systems/Olympus Users
The Olympus 100-400mm telephoto zoom lens easily fits in the small Hadley Pro bag from Billingham.
A few years ago, I was gifted a Billingham Hadley Pro shoulder bag. It’s a very well-made waterproof bag that is ideal for use as a walkabout bag for smaller kits. It’s dimensions are fairly small: 15 3/8″W x 6 3/8″ D x 9 3/8″ H. This makes the Hadley Pro an easy bag to put under an airplane seat as a personal item when traveling. I’ve taken this bag to places like Croatia and Scotland, where it was perfect for a small travel kit, like a Nikon Z7 ii and two zoom lenses.
However, I never thought I’d use this bag for transporting a super telephoto zoom. That is, until I tested it with my OM Systems OM-1 camera and Olympus 100-400mm f/5.0-6.3 lens, which has an equivalent angle of view to a 200-800mm lens on a 35mm format camera. By removing the lens collar (something I don’t need for hand-held shooting anyway), I was able to easily fit this telephoto zoom into the Hadley Pro bag. The OM-1 with 12-45mm f/4 lens attached fit as well, and I still had yet another empty compartment available to me.
Top view of the Billingham Hadley Pro bag with 100-400mm lens and OM-1 body with 12-45mm f/4 lens attached.
My colleague, Rick Walker, pointed out something else while we were out shooting together. One could theoretically pair the 100-400mm with the outstanding Olympus 12-100mm f/4 zoom and have a two lens kit that covers the entire range from 24-800mm equivalent, in a bag that fits under the seat of an airplane. Mind blown!
Rick recently got his hands on the new OM System (formerly known as Olympus) OM-1 mirrorless camera. This new micro 4/3 format camera delivers many features worthy of “flagship” designation, including an improved EVF, subject-detect AF, and up to 120fps RAW capture. There are also some areas for improvement, and we’ll talk about those, too. We’ll also answer some questions we received about the OM-1 from our Facebook Page readers.
This week, Jason revisits the Nikon Z9, which he’s now been using for two months. Jason recently published a wildlife photography settings guide for Nikon Z9 users. We’ll also recap some recent product announcements. Note: we’ll be off next week on vacation.
