ROBIN WONG

During my initial tests of the OM System PEN, I quickly found out that the AF performance has been dramatically improved, the first test I did to realize this was insect macro shooting. I revisited insect macro to recreate the same scenario which I found the AF to be so much quicker and confident, even more efficient than higher level OM System cameras like OM-1/OM-3, I am not joking. So I did a new video to test the AF performance of OM-1 vs PEN side by side using Olympus 60mm F2.8 Macro shooting extremely close up. The result is obvious, the PEN wins hands down. In that same video (click), I also did a POV showing how I captured some fresh insect macro shots. 

Here is a surprise - 1 have a photograph exhibited in the Spring Shopping Mall, Kuching, under the WAK Festival X Canon Malaysia "Celebrating Malaysia and Wild About Nature". The exhibition is running from 1st to 30th October 2026. I only have one photo there, taken a few years ago at Lebuh Ampang, showing an environmental portrait of a man selling bananas. I used a Canon 5D original and a Canon 35mm F2 lens. I was asked by my friend Allen Ang to submit something, so to show support to my fellow friends and community in Kuching, I chose this lone image, and it got selected! If you happen to be at the Spring, do check out the exhibition! As always, proud to be a Sarawakian. 

I brought the OM System PEN out around the city area of Kuala Lumpur to shoot some night scenes for my initial review of the camera. I intentionally wanted to test the 5-Axis Image Stabilization of the camera. OM Digital Solutions claimed 5.5EV stops effectiveness at the center and 4.5EV stops at the corners, and they numbers are quite conservative. I could easily hand-hold the camera down to 4 seconds shutter speeds and get away with sharp results consistently, shooting at wide angle (9mm and 14mm). To be honest anything more than 1-2 seconds shutter speed I'd rather just use a tripod for long exposure works, but the powerful stabilization helps to boost confidence in nailing the shots taken at, say 1/30 second, or even down to 1/2 second shutter speeds. To me, I cannot live without the image stabilization these days, definitely a must have feature in a modern camera. 

After all the hype and noise surrounding the new OM System PEN camera, it is time for a detox, and I thought what better way to do that by shooting with an old compact camera from the early digicam days. I brought the Olympus C-740 which I found in the used market at such a good condition for some shutter therapy. It only has 3.2MP CCD image sensor with a generous 10x zoom lens. Many of us (me included) get caught up with obsessing over the latest gear, but sometimes it isn't about the number of megapixels, or high ISO, or dynamic range and AF performance. Photography should be much simpler than that, we can choose to enjoy the process of making images by going back to basics. Sometimes, all you need is an old digital point and shoot camera!