Olympus E-620

	Design & Layout
	Hardware	Page 4 of 8	Modes

Design & Appearance

The design is boilerplate digital SLR, short on pizzazz but with nicely rounded surfaces on the right side of the back and on the front grip.

Size & Handling

The small-handed of either gender will be most comfortable shooting with the E-620. For this large-pawed reviewer the camera body is just a bit too wee to hold effectively, requiring quite a bit of maneuvering to keep my index finger over the shutter button and my hand in a proper grip position. On the flip side, smaller size means increased portability: the camera body measures just 5.11 x 3.70 x 2.36 inches (130mm x 94mm x 60mm) and weighs 16.76 ounces (475g) for the body alone, without lens or battery.

Our lovely hand model has fairly small mitts, yet the petite E-620 is barely visible when viewed from the front.

Menu

The key to controlling the E-620 effectively is the Super Control Panel, the display that fills the LCD screen when not in Live View mode (and can be brought up as an overlay in Live View as well). As shown here, this screen includes information on nearly every current camera setting. By pressing the OK button, the screen become live and each of these settings can be chosen (by moving a highlight cursor using the four-way controller) and changed. When an item is highlighted, turning the top control dial cycles through all available options. If you prefer to see all the options laid out on a separate screen, a second press of the OK button brings up the full menu page for the highlighted item. And pressing MENU returns you to the non-interactive information display.

The Super Control Panel offer instant access to a wide array of settings.

Most of the key picture-taking settings, including white balance, ISO settings, metering mode, autofocus settings, image stabilization settings, flash settings and drive mode/self-timer have dedicated buttons somewhere on the camera body. Between the Super Control Panel and this bevy of button-based shortcuts, navigating the standard Menu system is required infrequently. When you do visit, by way of the MENU button, you'll find five tabs, as seen below.

The menu system is divided into give sections

The setup menu indicated by the gears icon is particularly interesting. As shown below, it offers enough customization settings to please most demanding photographers, from the basics of turning the autofocus illuminator on or off to more esoteric behaviors, like adjusting which way the lens moves when you turn the focus ring in a given direction.

The E-620 provides a surprising depth of customizability for a sub-$1000 SLR.

Ease of Use

One of the striking features of the E-620 is the way Olympus has straddled the line between consumer-oriented simplicity and the fine controls and customization more sophisticated photographers desire. In addition to full auto for point-and-shoot control, there are 13 scene modes plus six Art Filters (discussed below) to tailor the camera to the shooting conditions at hand with minimal effort. The number of buttons, controls and options may look intimidating to an SLR newbie, but they can be safely ignored for point-and-shot photography. And for those who want to take greater control over their photographic efforts, the Super Control Panel and well-labeled buttons makes accessing sophisticated features fast and simple.

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Olympus E-620 Digital Camera First Impression Review Navigation
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