Okay. I've been shooting with Sony stuff for almost a year now and I'm pretty happy with it but.....every time I have coffee with my friend, Frank, he (unintentionally?) brings along some little Olympus jewel, the allure of which is absolutely undeniable. Yesterday it was the absolutely, drop dead gorgeous, Olympus 75mm 1.8 lens, If you shot in the 1970's or the early 1980's one of the lenses that everyone had and used frequently was the 135mm focal length on a regular 35mm camera. That focal length, coupled with a fast aperture, does some really nice stuff. It compresses compositions so you can "stack" stuff in the frame in a very pleasing way. If you are focusing on subjects in the 6 to 10 foot range and using apertures faster than f4 you get a deliciously sharp subject and a background that is wonderfully soft and devoid of distracting detail.
This lens is about 10% longer, relatively, than the 135s on 35mm but it's certainly in the ballpark.
I've owned the Pen 70mm f2 for years and used it on my Pens and now on my Sony Nex cameras. It's a very useful focal length and an antidote for all the endless wide angle crap that seems to be today's over riding style.
From all reports the new lens resides in a whole different world than the older optic. Sharp wide open and sharp right down. Silent and speedy focus on a Pen OMD. And since it's sharp at f1.8 you get the same basic look that we used to get with our big, heavy 135mm 2.8's but without all the dimensional sturm und drang.
If you are a Micro Four Thirds user you might want to read what DXO says about this lens. Spoiler alert: It beats the Leica 25mm in their tests!
http://www.dxomark.com/index.php/Publications/DxOMark-Reviews/Olympus-M.ZUIKO-DIGITAL-ED-75mm-f-1.8-Is-this-the-best-Micro-Four-Thirds-lens-available
If only Sony made lenses like this available. The Nex system would be an incredible value proposition. As it stands now the bodies are really great but the lens selection? Not so much. This lens, along with the 12mm, the 25 Leica, and the 45mm 1.8, goes a long way to cement Olympus's ascendant position in the new world order of cameras. Every other camera maker should take note.
