GEAR TESTS: OLYMPUS OMD-EM1

Jim Decker CEO

The Olympus OMD EM-1 has been one of our favorite mirrorless cameras since its release. We were pleased to hear that AOI will be supporting the Olympus OMD housing line with a series of ports in the very near future.

Unfortunately, there have not been many ports available for the Olympus OMD series housings. There was only 1 flat port available from Olympus, which did not lead to wide adoption of an otherwise good quality housing with decent ergonomics.

The first ports to be released from AOI are ports for the Panasonic 8mm fisheye lens and the Olympus 60mm macro. There are both glass and acrylic options available, with the acrylic versions being more budget friendly. I tested out the acrylic port for the fisheye lens and it worked great. No vignetting in the corners and nice sharp images.

The 60mm port has 67mm threads on the front of the port allowing the use of wet style close up lenses or other 67mm filters.

Ports will also be released in the future for the Olympus 12-50, 14-42, and 9-18 lenses. 

If you were thinking about purchasing an OMD housing from Olympus but were concerned about a lack of lens support from Olympus, AOI has you covered. Check backscatter.com for availability and pricing of the AOI Ports for Olympus OMD series housings.

Jean BruneaU Aquatica Technical Advisor

This year's Digital Shootout was the perfect occasion to field test our new AE-M1 housing for the Olympus OM-D E-M1  We had two units on hands along with the newly introduced SW8 port  the 4" Fisheye dome and the O-60 flat macro port  these where made available for participants to try as part of the extensive DEMO gear available at the Digital Shootout. The feedback was extremely positive, we knew it to be well balanced underwater, and that the layout of the controls was well done=85 but it's always nice to have someone else confirm this!

The AE-M1 housing uses optical fiber technology to get the S-TTL signal from the underwater strobes, this makes for zero maintenance in a reliable and streamlined package. The housing is quite compact and lightweight compared to regular DSLR kits, yet, its level of performance does rival them. Also, the Micro 4/3 series of lenses gives this system an excellent range of optics that are perfectly adapted for underwater photography.

Chris Parsons Nauticam Team Member

I was really looking forward to having customers try out the E-M1 here in Little Cayman. Great camera in a great housing… this is currently our best selling housing. Unfortunately, United Airlines had different plans for our demo camera and housing. Both ended up taking the long route from Long Beach to Florida, last seen in Seattle on a completely different airline. So no E-M1 here, unfortunately. But I have had the chance to dive with it recently, and am a fan of this camera. 

The E-M1 has become Olympus' flagship camera. Olympus is "all in" on the mirrorless format, and the micro 4/3 lens mount. For previous SLR users, the E-M1 has some features to make migrating easy, and even allows use of the original 4/3 lenses. 

The Nauticam housing wrestles the large number of densely packed controls on the camera, and makes them accessible and easy to use. Nauticam has been on the forefront on the micro 4/3 system, and the NA-EM1 is a highly refined housing, with an extremely well thought out control and feature set. The housing ships with the acclaimed Nauticam vacuum system electronics built in. By simply adding an optional valve, the housing is ready for a vacuum check, adding significant peace of mind about watertight integrity. Just flip on the vacuum switch, give it a few pumps, and the green light will indicate the rig is ready to dive. 

Word has it that our missing gear might have been found, though too late for this event. The E-M1 is the flagship mirrorless camera, and the NA-EM1 is the best selling mirrorless housing. You can bet we'll make more.