Olympus admits that its micro system cameras are still not pocketable and must attract more compact camera users looking to step up to a system with interchangeable lenses.
When Olympus and Panasonic first announced the Micro Four Thirds System standard, in August 2008, the companies said they wanted to win over compact camera users who find DSLRs ‘big, heavy and difficult to operate’.
Olympus UK?s Consumer Products marketing manager Mark Thackara said sales of Pen cameras are currently split 50:50 between existing DSLR users and those using a compact camera.
?A lot of younger people buy as an alternative to a compact but there is still a long way to go,? he told us.
In a recent interview with Amateur Photographer in central London, Toshiyuki Terada, manager of SLR planning for Olympus Tokyo (pictured), said Olympus last week unleashed new accessories for the Pen line-up in a bid to win over consumers yet to take the plunge into the system camera arena.
To help lure people to its Pen interchangeable lens camera system, Olympus announced the gadgets alongside its latest model, the E-PL2.
These included an optional hotshoe-mountable Bluetooth wireless adapter which allows photographers to transfer images to a compatible Android mobile phone, for example.
The ‘PenPal’ Bluetooth communication unit, priced around £70 and designed to store up to 2,600 images, aims to tap into the growing ‘social networking generation’.
The firm also announced compatible conversion lenses: a fisheye (£130), wideangle (£80) and macro (£50).
And a new £50 macro photography gadget called macro arm light, which plugs into the camera’s accessory port, is designed to provide lighting for close-up shots.
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