Olympus OM-D EM5 Sample Photos

Hello girlfriends ~~~~~ and boyfriends~~~ It's been several months since my last update. It's because (excuses) ahem-- It's because I was busy with house inspections and moving etc. I don't know how else I should re-iterate this but I H-A-T-E M-O-V-I-N-G!!!!! I absolutely hate moving!! The forever packing and forever unpacking and cleaning and buying furnitures making you wallets/purses bleed. I'm not rich so I did everything by myself. I'm my own removalist, my own cleaner and my own handy man. Except for furnitures of course because I can't build stuff right. I ain't no carpenter. Took me months to find the "perfect" place to move but I've finally moved and settled down a little bit. I'm still waiting on a couple pieces of furniture which I've been waiting for almost a month now. So my bedside lamps have been sitting in the lounge room on the floor next to my couch and I still have boxes half opened sitting in the lounge. Anyways, point being of me not updating my blog is because I was absolutely flat out with moving and settling down at the new place.

Since moving, I haven't spent any time inside the house for longer than 8 hours because I really miss city life and I always find any excuse to go to the city and thank Goodness I have to pass through city every time I go home from work. Well, I did spend one Sunday on the couch all day and I absolutely LOVE it!!! I'm such a hyperactive person that I rarely could sit at home doing nothing for a long period of time. I feel useless otherwise.

Back to the point of this entry. Recently, I bought a new awesome camera (gone bankrupt now) and just sold my old Panasonic Lumix GF2 which had been with me for 4 years old. Surprisingly, I was a bit sad when I handed it over to the new owner :( and I'm hoping it would be treated with care. The new owner looks like he knows a lot about photography, more than I do anyways from the look of him tweaking with the setting and swiftly taking a sample shot. So, at least it is going to be used to the fullest potential. I'm such an amateur and I don't know why I would spend so much on a camera but who cares. I'm learning, ok! At least I admitted I know nothing about photography, not like many out there who claim they're experts but they're just wannabes.

I took my new toy, Olympus OM-D EM5 series which is a cheaper version of the newer series OM-D EM1 which costs a lot more expensive than the EM5. I think EM1 costs about $1700+ where as I got a good deal for mine, $999 with 3 interchangeable lenses. One for outdoor, one for indoor and one for portrait. I took my baby out for some test shots in Footscray Park last week and the shots (according to yours truly), were amazing. I absolutely have fallen in love with my new baby. There is still a lot to learn about DSLR camera and thankfully, because I bought my camera from Michaels Camera, I received a complimentary 3-hour  photography class for beginner DSLR users and thanks to Olympus, I also received an exclusive one on one coffee and cake session with a qualified Olympus photography advisor who will teach you tricks about your newly purchased camera for 45 minutes!!! I was smittened!!! According to the sales guy from Michaels Camera, Olympus is the only brand that offers personalised service like this. I was going to buy a Canon or Nikon but I was convinced to convert to Olympus instead. I've booked my sessions but they're not until March/April :( In the meantime, I just have to put my super amateur skill on and please bear with me.

I'm not going to discuss specifications regarding this camera because there are a lot of professional camera review websites out there in the web and they will provide more details with full on tech jargons and everyone can play pretend to know what they are talking about. I know nothing about photography anyway so no point of me talking all s***s about things I don't know. No offence towards photography enthusiasts. Me, I only enjoy the end result of it. I enjoy looking and admiring good photos and sometimes I think I take good photos too. I have no photoshop skill whatsoever, so the photos I am showing below have very minimal editing and some don't even have any editing at all. So what you see are the raw potential of this camera.

Here we go... JENG JENG JENG

By the way, the setting is mostly in Auto mode as I am still learning but the ISO has been set at low as 100 in most of the photos as they are all outdoor photos. I know pretty much the basic stuff (i.e. adjusting appropriate ISO level when it is outdoor versus indoor). When you are outdoor, you're supposed to adjust the level of ISO as low as possible to increase the shutter speed. Whereas in low light environment, ISO level should range between 600-3200 depending on camera to decrease shutter speed in order to stabilise photo. Preferably using a tripod to make sure the image is still. The only downside is the photos may turn out grainy.

My test model for the day

I took this photo from a pretty far distance using the 40-150mm zoom lens and I love the result.

I find it extremely hard to shoot a moving animal because for obvious reason, they move all the time, hence it is so hard to capture a perfectly focused object. I wanted this bird to face me but it just refused to do so. It just kept showing its bum to me. Maybe I was too invasive but I made sure I stood at a pretty far range and moved quietly. I find that I actually love shooting animals and scenery because they're quite challenging.

If I could photoshop this photo, I would accentuate the feature of those feathers and make the hues darker to outline those beautiful feathers. The light was a bit bright. I should've used the UV filter to cover the lens. Maybe in my next experiment.

Yours truly. Again, just a bit too bright I guess. The sun was quite strong 

Random cyclist along Maribyrnong River. This track is very popular amongst cyclists and heaps of people fish on this river and show off their boats. 

View of Melbourne CBD from Maribyrnong River. The photo is not sharp enough. 

Went to Vietnamese Lunar New Year festival in Footscray last week organised by one of the biggest Vietnamese community in Melbourne. It was very busy with live music, hundreds of food stalls, local community promoting their networks and other random stalls. 

This guy is Japanese and man he can sing like a cowboy! He sings, plays guitar and harmonica at the same time. He usually basks around the city and this time he actually got invited to play on stage at the festival. He can sing country music extremely well and when I first heard him miles away, I thought he was American and boy I was wrong. 

I absolutely love this zoom lens as the photo produced is still very crystal clear and it blurs out the rest of the unnecessary background such as this dude who was blocking my view. 

His companion on stage.

I didn't want to post this picture because it is out of focus but since this lady was enjoying herself dancing and she was wearing traditional Vietnamese costume. So I thought I should share it with you guys. 

That's it for my first experiment and if anyone has any photography tips to share, I'm willing to accept any suggestion with open mind. Please drop any comment down below and stay anonymous if you're more comfortable that way.