Olympus E-30 mid-range D-SLR announced

Posted by Al Warmington on Wed 5 Nov 2008

Art Filters to help photo noobies shoot like a pro

Olympus has plugged a big gap in its digital SLR line-up with the newly announced Olympus E-30.This 12.3 megapixel beast actually outdoes the more expensive E-3 in terms of megapixels and it has a bigger LCD display at 2.7".

It also features an 11-point AutoFocus, 5 frames per second continuous shooting and 12 bit colour depth.

Unless you're a very serious photo buff, there's not a lot to separate the competing mid-range dSLR options from each other; a little extra outlay gets a few extra megapixels , faster shooting modes and incremental upgrades in colour depth and ISO sensitivity. So the main challenge SLR makers face is finding other ways to distinguish their offering from the crowd.

Olympus is pinning its hopes on its new Art Filters system to stoke the fires of creativity in its users. These let you set special filter effects in place before you take the shot. They consist of Pop Art, Soft Focus, Pale & Light Colour, Light Tone, Grainy Film and Pin Hole, which basically play around with colours, tones, contrast and brightness in different ways to create a set of unique styles. You can also preview the effect onscreen before you start taking the shot.

Pros will obviously know their cameras well enough to affix these settings manually, but it may give camera novices a chance to learn more about what does what, and experiment with more creative shots while they're learning the ropes.

The Olympus E-30 is expected to launch in mid-January, 2009. UK prices are still being worked on, but across the pond they're expecting them to go for $1,299 (around £800).

Link: Olympus