Olympus E-520 Review

A fully-fledged mid-range DSLR in a compact body, at an entry-level price – this is how one could distill the essence of the Olympus E-520 into one sentence. The new camera inherits the very well designed body, efficient handling and semi-professional feature set of its predecessor, and gains important capabilities such as wireless TTL flash control, Shadow Adjustment Technology and contrast-detect auto-focus in Live View. JPEG shooters will be delighted to learn that the default tone curve applied by the in-camera processing yields much more pleasing out-of-camera results, particularly with respect to the way specular highlights are rendered. RAW shooters will like the fact that the sensor has a wide dynamic range, even if they have to look beyond Olympus' own raw development solutions to extract the maximum out of it. Photographers who like to make big, detailed prints will be delighted to hear that the E-520, with the right Noise Filter setting applied, will retain most details right up to its highest sensitivity settings. Those interested in infrared photography will likely find it helpful that the camera's Live View Boost option makes it possible to frame and focus even with an R72 filter attached to the lens.

So, is the Olympus E-520 the perfect camera then? Well, not quite. The viewfinder – an important part of any SLR – is just as small as the one built into the E-510. I am pretty sure Olympus could have upped its magnification by sacrificing some brightness, but they have chosen not to. Similarly, they could have put a more versatile auto-focus system into the camera – the current system is fine as regards its speed and reliability, but it could use a couple more AF sensors, preferably of the cross type.

I personally enjoyed using the E-520 very much, and doubt it would disappoint anybody who decides to buy one after careful weighing of its strengths and weaknesses. The Olympus E-520 is a camera that I can recommend to beginners and enthusiasts alike, and I would not be too surprised to see it in the hands of a few pro photographers, either.

Zoltan Arva-Toth

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