Olympus PEN E-PL1

Noise Reduction (5.62)

We test for image noise by shooting a brightly lit X-Rite ColorChecker chart with high ISO noise reduction turned off, and at each available noise reduction level setting (in this case, low, standard and high). As seen in the chart, noise levels start out below 1% with noise reduction turned off (to preserve maximum fine detail levels), but results are barely usable by the time you hit ISO 800, and hopeless after that. Cranking up the noise reduction level has a substantial effect, but as seen in the sample high ISO images seen here, you pay a considerable price in lost detail at anything beyond the standard level. Considering the trade-off, your choice of setting will ultimately be guided by what you’re shooting (is there much detail to lose?), and how you’re planning to display the shot (a small image viewed on-screen can survive a lot more abuse than an 11×14′ print).

Occasionally one component of the total image noise will be notably higher than the others, making noise much more apparent to the eye. That’s not the case here: the red, green, blue, yellow and chroma (grey) noise levels are tightly grouped. More on how we test noise.

We expect to find problems with high image noise in Micro Four Thirds cameras, with their smaller sensor size leading to smaller photo receptors and more electrical crosstalk, and the E-PL1 followed the pattern. It did score a bit higher here than the Olympus E-P1 and Panasonic GF1, though, a pleasing result from a less expensive model.

ISO Options

The ISO settings range from 100-3200. There is also an Auto ISO function, which will make the setting automatically based on lighting conditions. The user can set an upper limit to the auto ISO, and a default value.

We don’t see a lot of ISO bracketing around these parts, but it’s provided in the E-PL1. In a three-shot sequence, the ISO value is raised and lowered from the current setting by 0.3, 0.7 or 1.0 EV.

Focus Performance

The camera uses eleven autofocus areas, as shown in the diagram below. You can let the camera select one, in All Target mode, or choose one manually using the four-way controller. Since the leftmost button on the four-way is the shortcut for selecting an autofocus area, the process is fast and simple. You can also assign the Fn or movie button to automatically return the AF point to a predetermined target, but this doesn’t seem like a particularly compelling use of scarce button resources.

One of the major beefs with the Olympus E-P1 and E-P2 was autofocus speed. Actually ‘speed’ isn’t even the right word, since ‘crawl’ more accurately reflects the experience. In April, Olympus released a firmware update for the E-PL1 (and the other PEN cameras) that promises to improve autofocus speed by 15%. We updated our review cameras, took it for a test drive and (drum roll please)… found that the update lives up to its promise. Of course, the key question is whether faster is fast enough, and that really depends on what you’re shooting. When the lights are low, autofocus performance is still mighty pokey (and there’s no autofocus assist lamp to help out). In a normally lit room shooting candids, you’re probably going to be alright. Trying to follow the action at a school football game it’s hit and miss.Initial focus acquisition time is still going to make you miss out on some key plays. If you know who you’re shooting, though, lock on and use the continuous autofocus tracking option, you’ll succeed more often than not.

If you turn face detection on, the camera will find a face and focus on it when you’re using all target mode. If you’ve selecting an autofocus target manually, the camera can still use face detect for exposure control, but will focus on the target you’ve chosen.

Long Exposure (7.30)

In our long exposure testing, we measure both color accuracy and image noise at shutter speeds from one second to 30 seconds, under low light. The Olympus E-PL1 image noise results were very close to those found with other Micro Four Thirds cameras we’ve tested, including the Olympus E-P1 and the Panasonic GF1, all of which are notably higher than the Nikon D5000 and Samsung NX10, both of which use larger APS-C format sensors. For color accuracy, the E-PL1 color error is pretty high across the range of shutter speeds, though not as far off as the Panasonic GF1. More on how we test long exposure.

Shooting in the most accurate faithful mode, color error under low light is significantly higher than in our bright light testing. Saturation, though, remains nearly the same under both shooting conditions.

The long exposure noise reduction system actually resulted in noisier images across most shutter speeds. This is not that unusual and, if you think about how this type of processing works, not surprising. With long exposure noise reduction enabled, the camera takes a shot with the shutter open and then takes a second shot with the shutter closed. It then analyzes the noise pattern in the second, dark exposure and tries to mathematically eliminate that pattern from the actual exposure. Problem is, noise is inherently random, so the patterns in the two shots are unlikely to match unless there’s some consistent flaw in the sensor. It’s rare that we see this type of processing produce any significant gain, and in this case we’d leave it off entirely for low-light shooting.

The two cameras with APS-C sensor basically clobbered the Micro Four Thirds models in this test.

Video: Low Light Sensitivity (0.55)

In our low light sensitivity test, the E-PL1 required 26 lux of light to reach 50 IRE on the waveform monitor. This is more light than was needed by the other cameras we compared the E-PL1 to — including last year’s E-P1.

Low light sensitivity does have a lot to do with what kind of lens you are shooting with, so if you attach a faster lens to the E-PL1 you can probably improve the camera’s low light performance significantly. The kit lens we did our testing with was not very fast, with its widest aperture setting being f/3.5. Most consumer camcorders have aperture values of around f/1.8 at their widest setting. This lets more light into the lens, thus resulting in better low light performance.