One of the best cameras I have ever used — not just half frame. Heavy, fully manual, and optically extraordinary.
The Olympus Pen F had been a camera I avoided for a long time. It is one of the only mechanical SLRs in half frame and one of the original half frame cameras — but two things had always discouraged me. First, it is almost as big and heavy as many full-frame 35mm SLRs. Second was the lack of a meter. As interests wax and wane, the Pen F eventually became increasingly desirable. A lot of the images HFC members submitted with the Pen F were just really good. So I finally bit the bullet.
When you pick it up it feels heavy and solid — like it was hewn from a single piece of metal. Like any SLR, focus and aperture are adjusted on the lens, but unlike most SLRs the shutter speeds are adjusted by a dial on the front. Speeds from B to 1/500. I used the 38mm/1.8, which is fairly zoomed at about 53mm equivalent compared to most half frames. I found the lens a joy to use.
I shot Fuji C200 using a modified Sunny 16 approach. I really liked the ability to focus on closer objects and get a blurry background. The longer focal length produced images quite different from what I am used to with half frame — I found myself experimenting with alternate subject matter. The images have a cinematic quality I do not get from my Pens.
