The lens also has a Function button on the side that your thumb can easily reach. There are many options you can assign to the button just as with every other function button on the OM-D E-M1 body. The 40-150mm f2.8 Pro is the first Olympus lens to feature dual VCM auto focus. The idea is that AF performance can be improved by separating the focusing mechanism into two lens groups controlled by individual linear drive voice coil motors. This and the absence of gears, claims Olympus, makes the focussing performance lightning fast and very smooth.

The Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 40-150mm f2.8 Pro is a high-end telephoto zoom for the Micro Four Thirds system – as such it’ll work on any modern Panasonic or Olympus body. It was originally teased in September 2013 at the launch of the OMD EM1 and 12-40mm f2.8 Pro zoom, but took a whole year to finally come to market, officially being announced during Photokina in September 2014. The constant f2.8 aperture is maintained throughout the focal range, a very useful feature and not just for shooting in low light. The physical aperture diaphragm construction is composed of 9 blades which produce a circular shaped aperture that should result in pretty circular blob highlights for out of focus elements. At the other end of the range the minimum aperture is f22. The Olympus 40-150mm f/2.8 lens is a workhorse zoom that will make into the kit of most micro four thirds shooters needing an 80-300mm 35mm equivalent reach. It’s great for wedding and portrait photographers as well as nature and sports. Size isn’t the only innovation here. While weather-sealing is common, few lenses go through the tests to gain an IP rating that specifies just how much abuse it can withstand. The OM 40-150mm f4 has an IP53 rating. That means it’s tested for dust without harmful deposits and tested against water sprays up to 60 degrees from a vertical spray. OM Solutions also says it’s freeze-proof as well. Tech Specs Compared to other Olympus primes and zoom lenses, the 40-150 is top notch. At 40mm, the 40-150mm edges out the 12-40mm @ 40mm at ƒ/2.8 with better corner sharpness, for instance. At 70mm, the 40-150mm displays nearly identical sharpness characteristics to the well-regarded Olympus 75mm ƒ/1.8 prime @ ƒ/2.8. And at 150mm, the 40-150mm is very similar to, if not just slightly sharper than the Olympus 150mm ƒ/2 Four Thirds lens @ ƒ/2.8 and stopped down.The colors coming from this lens were consistent with what I’d expect from the E-M1 Mark III. Colors are a more neutral starting point, without being overly saturated or taking on other tones. Colors and contrast will naturally look a bit more washed out when lens flare is captured. Extra Image Samples Likewise, the tripod collar takes a slight bit of study (if you want to remove it). But it’s a pretty standard slotted design, so if you’re coming from recent big lenses from other makers, you’re likely to know the drill already. Basically, the collar only comes off in one orientation, otherwise it just turns to a new position. There is of course an interesting alternative for those who don’t need that extra 50mm reach and want a smaller lens that won’t unbalance the kit too much: the Lumix 35-100mm f/2.8. And this is another positive aspect about the new zoom: Olympus has released something different from everything else out there to bring the MFT system a step closer to completion. OM System says the 40-150mm f4 Pro is the lightest, most compact 300mm equivalent zoom with a fixed aperture. It weighs just over 13 ounces and, when retracted, is less than four inches long. Indeed, it felt more like carrying a wide-angle prime than a 300mm lens. Of course, much of that weight savings comes from the narrower f4 aperture and the crop factor of Micro Four Thirds that pushes this lens to a 300mm equivalent.

The M.ZUIKO Digital ED 40-150mm f/2.8 is a particularly pleasing lens to operate. Everything from its smooth zoom ring to push pull AF/MF ring works well. The zoom ring motion is as smooth at its widest focal length as it is at full telephoto and offers a pleasing fluid motion that I found just a fraction stiffer than AF/MF focus ring. Inside the 40-150mm f2.8 Pro there are 16 elements in 10 groups including ED, Super ED, EDA and HD elements. Essentially these technologies are designed to reduce internal light dispersion (ED stands for Extra-low dispersion, EDA is Extra-low Dispersion Aspheric and HD is High refractive index & Dispersion) and improve image quality and contrast. For depth of field, yes, but for light (T Stop), it’s the same as a 2.8 on full frame. Smaller aperture diameter? Yes. But, also a smaller sensor to light. The T stop is photons per second, per square millimeter. Let’s start with the constant fast aperture of 2.8, which is certainly the main characteristic that will attract users in the first place. On a Micro Four Thirds camera, it becomes even more important because it is likely the aperture you will use 90% of the time to get more light and a shallow depth of field. On my Lumix 35-100mm f/2.8 I rarely use apertures like f/4 or 5.6, and the same went for the 40-150mm. So good performance at 2.8 is essential for a lens like this, starting with sharpness. The barrel of the OM System 40-150mm f4 Pro is mostly metal. The exception is that, when the lens is extended, the piece that protrudes from the barrel is plastic. There’s also a bit of plastic around the front of the lens and the lens hood is plastic.Professional lenses are always expected to be able to survive a bit of a battering from those it’s used by, and there’s nothing to suggest the M.ZUIKO Digital ED 40-150mm f/2.8 will get damaged easily. Even a collision with a solid spectator barrier, albeit a glancing blow, failed to damage the lens in any way during our hands-on experience. As you’d expect there’s a rotating tripod collar, and that collar can be removed if you’re going to handhold the lens. Unlike some tripod collars (I’m looking at you, Nikon), the foot extension is about as solid as they come; I couldn’t detect any flex in it, and considering the light overall weight of a setup you’d be using with it in place, I can’t imagine that the tripod collar itself would be a source of vibration or ringing of other vibrations. A little heavy for the m4/3 system but not too much so. Keep in mind it is equivalent to an 80-300 F2.8 full frame angle of view. The M.ZUIKO Digital ED 40-150mm f/2.8 is designed to meet the expectations of serious Micro Four Thirds users that demand a long zoom and the type of ruggedness you’d expect from a lens that comes with a four-figure price tag.

The lens weights about 760g without the tripod mount, which is heavier than the E-M1 or any other MFT camera. I decided to use it with the E-M1 without the HLD-7 battery grip, not only to keep the combo as small as possible but also to see how the extra weight and size would affect the usability of a system known to be more compact than this. After carrying it around every day for my daily work for two weeks, I can say that in the end that the weight and size don’t make a huge difference, as the lens still fits nicely inside my primary camera bag, the Lowerpro Event Messenger 150. Yes, the lens is big but still compact enough for the zoom range it covers. But the real game changer comes when you screw on the tiny Olympus 1.4x teleconverter – thus converting the Olympus into an 80-210mm F4 lens or 160-420mm F8 lens in full-frame terms. ” As a professional photographer, I tend to only look at two lines of Olympus lenses, the Premium line (excellent IQ, but non-weather-sealed and slower apertures) or the Pro line (weather sealing, superior optics, often faster apertures) that this zoom lens falls into. You should have the impression that I like this lens. I do. I like it an awful lot. Enough so that I’m going to sell my Panasonic 35-100mm f/2.8 and get this one. As I noted above, if a lens tends to stay on your camera more, it’s more convenient, and that extra 50mm and good close focus distance mean that the Olympus was staying on my camera more than the Panasonic.

Buy. Sell. Trade. Create.

In the world of online photography forums, one of the negatives you will read about m4/3 systems is the inability to achieve a shallow depth of field. In portraits and especially at weddings, beautiful bokeh is looked fondly upon and part of some very salable looks for clients. It should not be the sole objective, but I digress. While it’s small and comparatively light the M.Zuiko 40-150mm f2.8 Pro nonetheless feels like a solid piece of optical engineering. The zoom and focus rings have a textured finish that provides a secure comfortable grip and the motion of the zoom ring is super-smooth with enough resistance to maintain the set focal length without creeping if the lens is pointed up or down. Olympus servicing includes a complete inspection of all functions and repair and/or replacement of all parts necessary to ensure your product meets factory specifications.

Initial sharpness looked excellent, both on the E-M1’s display and in Lightroom, suggesting it’s a lens more than capable of resolving the finer details in the frame. The Xiaomi 12T Pro offers a whopping 200MP main camera, but how does this perform, and do the other cameras deliver? Joshua Waller puts it through its paces. The lens gives excellent results in terms of sharpness, bokeh and versatility. It is certainly the biggest lens for MFT but don’t be fooled by its appearance. It is actually not that big for what it delivers. The MC-14 extends the focal length to 210mm at the 150mm end, causing the angle of view to shrink to 5.8°, equivalent to that of a 420mm lens on a 35mm camera. FocusingAlthough not the first M.ZUIKO Pro series lens to feature a dust, splash and freezeproof construction (this goes to the M.ZUIKO Digital ED 12-40mm f/2.8), it’s the first telephoto lens in the range that’s been made to withstand the severity of professional use. The OM System 40-150mm f4 Pro is capable of focusing as close as 27 inches from the front of the lens. At 150mm, that’s about a .41x macro on a 35mm equivalent. It gets in pretty close for atelephoto lens. The Olympus M.Zuiko Digital ED 40-150mm f/2.8 Pro lens accepts 72mm screw-in filters. The thread does not rotate on focus, making the use of polarisers that much easier. Then there’s the standard-setting 70-200mm F2.8 lens for full-frame, which can absorb up to four times more light than the Olympus 40-150mm F2.8. However, the advantage of such a lens disappears once you stop down to F5.6, and when you do, you’ll still be left carrying a huge, absurdly heavy, and costly lens. If you were to compare an 80 mpx full-frame image to a 20 mpx µ4/3rds image, you’d find they have substantially similar noise and dynamic range.