Olympus EZ-M7530 M.Zuiko Digital 75-300mm 1:4.8-6.7 Lens II, suitable for all MFT cameras (Olympus OM-D & PEN models, Panasonic G series), black

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I thought of using a chess board as the target for the shootout, but decided to go with my daughter’s dollhouse because it was more fun. The dollhouse was lit with two Nikon SB800 speedlights bounced off two reflectors. Exposure was kept constant during the entire shoot by changing the light output of speedlights. Shutter speed was kept at 1/125s for all the frames. Optically, this lens performs reasonably well, producing good sharpness across the frame, at least. Compared to other lenses compatible with the Micro Four Thirds system, it falls short of the performance of the best lenses available. In this case, if I come closer – the pillars would look higher and drag attention from the houses. That isn’t something that I want. Super-telephoto lenses have a focal length of 300mm and beyond in full-frame equivalent. They are widely used for wildlife and sports photography. (Olympus has Micro 4/3 sensor, and its 300mm is equivalent to 600mm for a full-frame sensor). A note about the Zuiko 60mm F2,8 macro: this lens is the best I’ve ever used for hand held macro photography (I have experience from classics such as Zeiss Makro Planar 60mm F2,8, Canon FD 50mm F3,5, Zuiko 50mm F2,0 and Panasonic/Leica Elmarit 45mm F2,8). This lens works very well together with the IBIS in the recent Olympus bodies for hand held macro photography. I think the dedicated lens hood (or copies of it) is essential as it gives a better grip of the lens.

You can compare it for very long, but overall, if we don’t touch the very high end, I think that systems are competitive. Why Olympus 75-300mm F/4.8-6.7 II? Travel photography is a bit of everything, street, landscape, portraits, documentary. Basically anything, that can bring an atmosphere of a remote location. At 150mm and above, resolution suffers a bit. Wide open at ƒ/5.6 and 150mm, the central area of the frame is nice and sharp and we note some corner softness in the extreme corners, but stopping down to ƒ/8 or greater doesn't actually improve the corners - rather, the center degrades a bit to match the corners.has a little bit bigger apertures at both ends of the range, but I'm not sure if that is super important to me... Photographers mention that lower weight and IBIS allows them to hand-hold the setup, and therefore, take more interesting angles, have more creative freedom. I partially agree with that. Let’s compare The zoom action is smooth and I found the auto-focusing of this lens to be pretty fast and accurate. It isn’t a fancy lens by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a good, consistent performer. Olympus OM-D E-M1X + M.Zuiko 75-300 mm f/4.8-6.7 @ 300 mm, efov 600 mm, f/6.7, 1/1250, ISO-2000, 16 mm extension tube used, cropped to 3509 pixels on the width, Pro Capture H mode At 75mm, sharpness in the centre of the frame is limited, with the lens actually performing better towards the edges at all apertures. Sharpness across the frame is good at f/4.8 and improves to very good levels when stopped down to f/5.6. Zooming is not internal – as you can see, the front extends considerably upon zooming to 300mm. The zoom ring is sufficiently wide and neither too stiff nor too loose. Zoom creep is not an issue. The focus ring is narrow and ribbed, and is used to give impulses to the micromotor that moves the lens elements – in other words, it is not mechanically coupled. The lens accepts filters via a standard 58mm thread around the – non-rotating – front lens element.

Sharpness differences are quite marked around the 300mm ends of the lenses – at 300mm, my copy of Panasonic 100-300mm f/4-5.6 was significantly sharper than the Olympus 75-300mm f/4.8-6.7 lens. Bokeh is a word used for the out-of-focus areas of a photograph, and is usually described in qualitative terms, such as smooth / creamy / harsh etc. In the M.ZUIKO Digital 75-300mm f/4.8-6.7 ED, Olympus employed an iris diaphragm with 7 rounded blades, which has resulted in a pretty nice bokeh for a zoom lens, at least in our opinion. However, recognising that bokeh evaluation is subjective, we have provided a few examples for your perusal. You have to keep it in mind when making the shot. There is a fox, I guess it is hiding from me. I am of the far end of the zoom, but this isn’t enough. Cropping wouldn’t help, there are not enough details. Apart from zooming in the same direction as your other lenses (which I find is actually quit important), the 75-300 has an advantage in that it is wider at the short end. If you are using a camera with contrast detect auto-focusing, see if you can borrow or rent an E-M5 Mark III, E-M1 Mark III, or an E-M1X. This will allow you to try out the latest Olympus Contrast and Phase Detection AF. The softness you are experiencing may be more related to the auto-focus performance of your current camera rather than with this lens.Diffraction limiting sets in at ƒ/11, though the results at the shorter focal lengths aren't immediately obvious until ƒ/16 or ƒ/22, where we note very soft results across the frame (especially at 300mm). The scale on the left side is an indication of actual image resolution. The taller the column, the better the lens performance. Simple. And the things I haven’t tried, because they are in the higher-end cameras, not in my Olympus PEN PL9. That being said the Olympus 75-300-II is sharper than the Panasonic 100-300 because it doesn't have the moving OIS unit inside. Overall neither is particularly sharp at 300mm. In this chapter, I will explain where Olympus 75-300 can be used in travel photography. The next chapter tells about the very important lens’s limitations.