Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45 mm F1.8 Lens, Fast Fixed Focal Length, Suitable for All MFT Cameras (Olympus OM-D & PEN Models, Panasonic G-Series), Silver

Product Information

To evaluate the real-life performance of the Lumix 42.5mm f1.7 lens, I shot this exterior scene at every aperture setting using an Olympus OMD EM1 mounted on a tripod. It’s also worth noting that the performance of the two lenses can decrease on Lumix cameras because Panasonic’s DFD AF technology is not compatible with Olympus lenses. The blue column represents readings from the centre of the picture frame at the various apertures and the green is from the edges. Averaging them out gives the red weighted column.

Not very often I come accross a lens that's that good and that I have little or nothing to complain about. The optional lens hood I did not buy. Instead I bought a more affordable Chinese JCC copy. Apart from a tiny bit of a loose fit, it's just fine. Again, if this focal length is what you are looking for, I don't think that you'll be disappointed.I would say that this is a lens worth considering if you have a Panasonic camera and can make use of the optical stabilisation. Otherwise, the Olympus 45mm is still a valid lens and you can find it for less money. The Nocticron is aimed at a professional audience and I would only consider it if you shoot portraits for a living.

Couple of things that I wish it had from it's sibling the 12mm F/2 is the snap focus feature (I think all Olympus lenses should have this feature now). But Olympus tried it's best to keep costs down so I respect that. However there is no excuse not to have a lens hood included and also a protective lens pouch. Lateral chromatic aberrations, typically seen as blue or purple fringes along contrasty edges, are very well controlled with this lens - the example below shows the worst-case scenario you are likely to encounter.The minimum focus distance of the two lenses is identical (50cm) while the maximum magnification is just a little higher on the 1.8 lens (0.1x vs. 0.11x). One thing I missed with my Leica lens however was a working focus ring. Even though it has got one, the full functionality of the ring is not supported by Olympus bodies. I enjoyed this feature on my old Sigma lenses so much so that it got me searching for a new lens.

With the lens wide open, you can see some light fall-off in the corners, but it is not very severe, and goes away almost completely upon stopping down to f/2.8. But is the difference in image quality that relevant? Is the 1Ev advantage in aperture that significant? The scale on the left side is an indication of actual image resolution. The taller the column, the better the lens performance. Simple. There's always a risk of disappointment when you finally get the thing you've been hoping for, but I haven't found that to be a problem with the 45mm. The PEN Mini isn't the obvious body to mount it on - a model with little direct control, aimed squarely at a demographic that tends not to buy additional lenses - but it's still an Olympus, so buried away in there somewhere are all the customization options in the world. A few minutes spent enabling the Super Control Panel and toning down the noise reduction and sharpening left me with a seriously compact combination set up to produce very likeable JPEGs.

Olympus M.Zuiko Digital 45mm f1.8 Digital Lens - Black - Sample Images

I shot the scene using the EM1’s RAW mode and processed the files in Adobe Camera RAW (ACR) via Photoshop using the following sharpening settings: 50 / 0.5 / 36 / 10. All lens corrections were disabled, so there’s no software compensation for vignetting, geometric distortion or chromatic aberrations, although note the camera may be applying some corrections before the RAW file is recorded which can’t be disabled. The EM1 was set to its base sensitivity of 200 ISO and the lens focused on the center of the composition using magnified Live View assistance. The corner and center crops shown below were taken from the areas marked with the red squares, right, and presented at 100%.