Good info as always. Lots of detail that one does not find in the "instruction manual" or elsewhere. Just got one today and now I'm doing the research on it. A cousin has one and really likes it, so it was not a big gamble. I have found that it won't focus on a blank wall, but if I get a light switch or other break in the wall, no problem.
Thank you for the nice video! I own this lens for one week and it is realy fantastic. The construction is more then 10 years old. Still it is one of the best macro lens in the market. It works also very well with the post focus function of the panasonic GX80 and G81. The focus stacking to a JPEG is done directly in the camera. It is only 4k but often enough. I was not shure, if this will work with a OM lens. With the G9 body it should work with 6k. Focus bracketing is of course also possible.
My favourite lens! I've had my Oly 60mm f2.8 macro for a few years. I've never felt the need for a lens hood. I haven't had lens flare. You mentioned about how you need to turn the manual focus ring a long way... You don't. Set your camera to MF, push the focus limiter forward. It'll be at 1:1. Move the camera in and out to get your focus. I use my GX9, good results even with ambient light. I would urge anyone interested in close up or macro, to get the 60mm. The image quality is brilliant. The lens is not big or heavy like modern Oly/OM lenses.
I love this lens. It really is a brilliant little lens. I have the Olympus macro flash, which combined with this lens is just wonderful for insects and flower
It's a fantastik lens. And with the Olympus STF-8 you can do everything! You can direct the light where you want, and the strenght of it, so you can decide how dark the shadows will be. And where you want them to be.
Thank you, good information. I do have and use this lens. Just a suggestion, perhaps this would have been more watched at about half the length of the video.
I was using my 60mm yesterday at the Botanic Gardens. Perfect for that! I also took my hardly used 25mm and 17mm f1.8 (l’ve had them for several years) and was actually surprised how good they were! I think the cheapness of those two lenses, and the 45mm, put me off them! The 17mm was perfect for taking tree canopies and getting under ferns. And talk about sharp!!!! One or two of them will now accompany me in the future. The 60mm is great for shooting bees! And you can add macro filters to it as well. Don’t have a lens hood, should look for one. Interestingly, I had these on my new EM1Mk3, and they seemed to be better than on my EM5Mk3! Sensor difference??? Thanks for this video, Brian, great images!
I know it's not the quickest Auto focus doing macro, but it's fast enough to come in handy on a windy day. I was able to get a great shot of a trip of japanese beetles on a moving leaf with bokeh to boot. Fun lens.
At the moment this must be one of the best bargains in photography (putting the lens hood thing aside, which annoys me too). There are some great offers on this lens and it is an outstanding bit of kit. To me it sums up what MFT is about - compact, light and superb optical quality. One of the outstanding lenses of the MFT world. As an aside, I found your channel recently and am enjoying going through the videos. As well as the excellent presentation and content, as a Carlisle man living in Singapore it's nice to be reminded of home.
Nice analysis. Macro photography is challenging. I thought you (or I) got a little lost on the 1:1 and 2:1 comparison with full frame. With 1:1 in full frame, you can shoot life size with a subject 36 mm wide.Of course, with MF43, at 1:1, that subject will not fit in the frame. By the same token, at 1:1, a subject 18 mm wide will be life size but will not fill a full frame sensor, while at 1:1 it will fill the frame of a MF43 sensor.
That’s correct, but with the same real focal length lens (I.e.a 60mm on both) I’ll be twice the distance away or to be the same distance away the FF would need to be a 120mm
I shoot Macro on a full frame camera and I've gotta say, the depth of field advantages of the micro four thirds system in this genre definitely appeal. While I get an advantage in light gathering due to sensor size, it's immediately negated by the incredibly shallow depth of field a full frame sensor at that distance generates. Most of my Macro work is shot at f11-f16 unless I'm image stacking, but because I shoot tarantulas that can decide to have a walkabout at any minute, stacking is not always possible. The micro four thirds lenses always seem such an impressive and well priced option. If I could afford to buy into two systems I'd definitely jump in. Until then, I'll just have to manage my focal plane and work as creatively as possible. Great information as ever Brian.
I happen to have that lens on my G9 at the moment and it is a fantastic lens (I actually bought it used from KEH for under US$400 with a really nice padded bag and a hood--it was the wrong one but they shipped me the right one for free). Although I usually carry 16-800 EFL lenses, I've kept the Oly 60mm mounted for hours on end, as in addition to macros (and you don't need flowers or bugs for that--"macroland" is it's own special world any time of year), 120mm is a nice FL, as it enables you to exclude a lot of distracting elements. I'll leave it to "traditional landscape" photographers to produce the "postcards"--I'm more interested in the mostly-overlooked details of our environment. Re aperture, macros often "require" a lot of DoF, so you need to stop down anyway (even with the DoF advantage over "FF") and/or stack, although I usually try to keep it below f/16 (f/32 FF equivalent) to avoid diffraction. Also, I almost always rely on ambient light and rarely use a tripod--I know that those are required in many cases, but I like to travel light! Re spooking bugs, that's when I use my Leica 100-400, as that provides an equivalent magnification of 0.5x--800mm from a minimum focusing distance of 1.3m/4.27' is a unique capability in photography! If I can get really close, then I use the Oly TG-5, as it has a minimum focusing distance of 1cm (!) and I have the "ring light" LED diffuser, so no problem there. It also has an optical magnification of 7x, plus in-camera focus stacking and bracketing. It's also submersible to 15m/50' and probably the most rugged camera on the market (it's been replaced by the TG-6, but that's virtually identical).
I always use Lowepro I have two lopsided 400 back packs and a much smaller one from them to (sorry I cannot remember the number) I only use them as they were available at the time for a good price and they work well for me.
Very well covered. There are definitely benefits of MFT and Olympus/OM-SYSTEM over other sensor sizes and brands. 1. Price. Most equivalent local lengths of other OEM brands are twice the price. Most 3rd party lenses are manual focus only, at the same price. 2. Many lenses don't have the focus limiters & 1:1 switches. 3. It is double the DoF to the equivalent focal length 4. Not only it's 2:1, you would need to have at least a 40mp full frame sensor to be able to crop in to a 2:1 equivalent and have double your f/stop. You could however get a full frame 2:1 lens but the closer you get to the subject, the shallower the DoF will become. You would end up needing to do some focus stacking. 5. Focus bracketing and stacking on the E-M5/OM-5 and E-M1/OM-1 is amazing. I'm able to get and eight frame in-camera focus stack jpegs hand held. Other people can do more. 6. Incredible IBIS that will help improve your focus stack success as long as you don't accidentally move towards the subject when it is stacking. 7. Bracketing and stacking will automatically sync with both Olympus and Godox flash units so you don't have to worry about recharge times in the menu. I use the E-M5 Mark III w/60mm, Godox TT-350 & Cygnustech diffuser. You can find me on Instagram @RobShootPhotos Shameless plug. 😁
All excellent points Rob. One thing though, on point four it’s an even bigger difference. The 2-1 factor (double the width of the sensor, double the height) is actually equivalent to 4 times the resolution to get the same effect so a 20Mp MFT equates to an 80Mp to get a 2-1 magnification. So MFT is even better in that respect.
The lens hood issue is silly, I agree... I enjoyed your review and appreciate the information you shared, for I am researching which glass will be best for macro work (something I haven't played with in probably a decade) and my E-M1X.
@@ThatMicro43Guy I was looking at the 90mm on B&H's site, in fact, immediately after watching your vid. The 2:1 magnification was particularly appealing. I'm leaning towards finding one over the winter (used in 9 or 9+ condition knocks prices down substantially) since most of my desired macro subjects are already disappearing with the imminent arrival of the first cold snaps and freezes here in North Dakota. Thanks for the input and the no-nonsense review.
Another point about this lens. I was curious about full frame macro lenses after this video. I looked for Sony full frame figuring that is representative full frame, macro lenses of which I saw two; 1 is a 105 mm. The other is a 90 mm both of these lenses weigh about a pound and a half and neither have quite the reach of this little gem usually when I am out shooting macro of insects and like I just can’t imagine trying to one-hand the camera with a pound and a half hunk of glass sitting on it as many times I may have a flash or something in my other hand. This little lens is just another league of size. There’s no way for what I like to do with going out and taking handheld insect shots for example, that I want to do this with one of those 1.5 pound behemoths. That is about four times as heavy as this little guy and you lose a little bit of reach!
Brian I just watched this feature, I have a 30mm Panasonic micro lens and you are quite right about having to get very near, however I have found using it as a general prime the picture quality in superb and have sold my 25mm 1.7 which is half the price and in my opinion not as good. ps the 30mm lens is also sold with no lens hood.
Yes, I use that one too, most of the time when using MFT. The 30mm macro is sharp edge to edge, right from wide-open, and without a hood on seems to have no flare problems. It is also made in Japan. Nice! I am less happy with the 25mm f1.7 as it is not always focusing correctly. When it does, it is OK, but still not the quality of the 30mm Lumix, with no distortion, sharp across the frame at all apertures one will use.
With the Bokeh, you can definitely tell the difference. Shoot the 40-150 f/2.8 at 60mm and the 60mm Macro side by side where you can create some bokeh balls. You will notice, depending how close you are to the subject, the macro lens will look more octagon. I love the looks of it.
Funny, I thought you where using a different lens, since you have the lens hood reversed on it. Mine also did not come with a lens hood, and they should 1euro. I use mine for photographing jewelry for sale on ebay mostly. Thanks.
I’m using my 60 mm on a Olympus OM-D-M5 Mark lll but when using in camera bracketing I am getting a halo on the final shot. Any idea what is causing this? Thanks.
By bracketing I presume you refer to focus bracketing? Only thing I can think of is that the camera or the subject have movement between shots. Are you using a tripod (and if so is it a good sturdy one?) or are you taking photos of a subject where it could be affected by wind?. You could also reduce the number of photos taken in the bracket.
@@ThatMicro43Guy Thank you for replying. I always use a tripod as I’m a still life photographer. It’s good. I usually take 10 shots maybe I’ll reduce it to 6 and see if that helps. Thanks.
Good info as always. Lots of detail that one does not find in the "instruction manual" or elsewhere. Just got one today and now I'm doing the research on it. A cousin has one and really likes it, so it was not a big gamble. I have found that it won't focus on a blank wall, but if I get a light switch or other break in the wall, no problem.
I use my lens as a more than i care to admit. I am pleased your review mirrors my experience.
Thank you for the nice video! I own this lens for one week and it is realy fantastic. The construction is more then 10 years old. Still it is one of the best macro lens in the market.
It works also very well with the post focus function of the panasonic GX80 and G81. The focus stacking to a JPEG is done directly in the camera. It is only 4k but often enough. I was not shure, if this will work with a OM lens. With the G9 body it should work with 6k. Focus bracketing is of course also possible.
What a really great little presentation. I really learned a lot & enjoyed the presentation style.
My favourite lens! I've had my Oly 60mm f2.8 macro for a few years. I've never felt the need for a lens hood. I haven't had lens flare.
You mentioned about how you need to turn the manual focus ring a long way... You don't. Set your camera to MF, push the focus limiter forward. It'll be at 1:1. Move the camera in and out to get your focus. I use my GX9, good results even with ambient light.
I would urge anyone interested in close up or macro, to get the 60mm. The image quality is brilliant. The lens is not big or heavy like modern Oly/OM lenses.
I love this lens. It really is a brilliant little lens. I have the Olympus macro flash, which combined with this lens is just wonderful for insects and flower
I have this lens , it's excellent and with the mft extra depth of field makes mft the ideal format for macro.
Very nice samples. I’m going to pick up a mini lighbox. Thanks
Have fun!
Great video mate. as usual. I'm waiting for mine to be delivered tomorrow to use with my GH5mii, can't wait. thank you
It's a fantastik lens. And with the Olympus STF-8 you can do everything! You can direct the light where you want, and the strenght of it, so you can decide how dark the shadows will be. And where you want them to be.
Nice one Brian and your welcome, need to meet up for a coffee
Thank you, good information. I do have and use this lens. Just a suggestion, perhaps this would have been more watched at about half the length of the video.
I was using my 60mm yesterday at the Botanic Gardens. Perfect for that! I also took my hardly used 25mm and 17mm f1.8 (l’ve had them for several years) and was actually surprised how good they were! I think the cheapness of those two lenses, and the 45mm, put me off them! The 17mm was perfect for taking tree canopies and getting under ferns. And talk about sharp!!!! One or two of them will now accompany me in the future. The 60mm is great for shooting bees! And you can add macro filters to it as well. Don’t have a lens hood, should look for one. Interestingly, I had these on my new EM1Mk3, and they seemed to be better than on my EM5Mk3! Sensor difference??? Thanks for this video, Brian, great images!
Best explanation of this lens I've seen--thank you!
Very kind, thank you
I know it's not the quickest Auto focus doing macro, but it's fast enough to come in handy on a windy day. I was able to get a great shot of a trip of japanese beetles on a moving leaf with bokeh to boot. Fun lens.
Thank you so much for explaining, the lens. I just acquired it today and was driving me crazy.
You’re welcome
At the moment this must be one of the best bargains in photography (putting the lens hood thing aside, which annoys me too). There are some great offers on this lens and it is an outstanding bit of kit. To me it sums up what MFT is about - compact, light and superb optical quality. One of the outstanding lenses of the MFT world. As an aside, I found your channel recently and am enjoying going through the videos. As well as the excellent presentation and content, as a Carlisle man living in Singapore it's nice to be reminded of home.
A little bit warmer where you are compared to walking down Botchergate in January lol
Very good review,got the same lens . Love it, thanks a lot 😊
Thanks for the video,, Brian.i have hear nothing but praise about this lens. I have my eye on a used one although macro is not really myhing
Nice analysis. Macro photography is challenging. I thought you (or I) got a little lost on the 1:1 and 2:1 comparison with full frame. With 1:1 in full frame, you can shoot life size with a subject 36 mm wide.Of course, with MF43, at 1:1, that subject will not fit in the frame. By the same token, at 1:1, a subject 18 mm wide will be life size but will not fill a full frame sensor, while at 1:1 it will fill the frame of a MF43 sensor.
That’s correct, but with the same real focal length lens (I.e.a 60mm on both) I’ll be twice the distance away or to be the same distance away the FF would need to be a 120mm
I shoot Macro on a full frame camera and I've gotta say, the depth of field advantages of the micro four thirds system in this genre definitely appeal.
While I get an advantage in light gathering due to sensor size, it's immediately negated by the incredibly shallow depth of field a full frame sensor at that distance generates. Most of my Macro work is shot at f11-f16 unless I'm image stacking, but because I shoot tarantulas that can decide to have a walkabout at any minute, stacking is not always possible.
The micro four thirds lenses always seem such an impressive and well priced option. If I could afford to buy into two systems I'd definitely jump in. Until then, I'll just have to manage my focal plane and work as creatively as possible.
Great information as ever Brian.
I happen to have that lens on my G9 at the moment and it is a fantastic lens (I actually bought it used from KEH for under US$400 with a really nice padded bag and a hood--it was the wrong one but they shipped me the right one for free). Although I usually carry 16-800 EFL lenses, I've kept the Oly 60mm mounted for hours on end, as in addition to macros (and you don't need flowers or bugs for that--"macroland" is it's own special world any time of year), 120mm is a nice FL, as it enables you to exclude a lot of distracting elements. I'll leave it to "traditional landscape" photographers to produce the "postcards"--I'm more interested in the mostly-overlooked details of our environment. Re aperture, macros often "require" a lot of DoF, so you need to stop down anyway (even with the DoF advantage over "FF") and/or stack, although I usually try to keep it below f/16 (f/32 FF equivalent) to avoid diffraction. Also, I almost always rely on ambient light and rarely use a tripod--I know that those are required in many cases, but I like to travel light!
Re spooking bugs, that's when I use my Leica 100-400, as that provides an equivalent magnification of 0.5x--800mm from a minimum focusing distance of 1.3m/4.27' is a unique capability in photography! If I can get really close, then I use the Oly TG-5, as it has a minimum focusing distance of 1cm (!) and I have the "ring light" LED diffuser, so no problem there. It also has an optical magnification of 7x, plus in-camera focus stacking and bracketing. It's also submersible to 15m/50' and probably the most rugged camera on the market (it's been replaced by the TG-6, but that's virtually identical).
I have a JJC hood. It snaps on and is secure, but you can't slide it back along the body like the Olympus hood.
I like my 60mm, not just for macro. OM brought out a firmware update this week for the 90mm Macro lens...catch up Brian 🙂
Already installed on my EM1mk2
I love mine on my Panasonic G9.
As you said it's a great lens. I wonder how Om-system will top this with the new 90 mm f3.5 pro lens coming out later this year.
That should be a really interesting lens especially for the reasons I said between the 30 & 60 lengths. A 90 will make it even better
Hi Brian, I love your videos. Do you have a camera backpack that you would recommend for a Olympus body and several lenses? Thanks
I always use Lowepro I have two lopsided 400 back packs and a much smaller one from them to (sorry I cannot remember the number) I only use them as they were available at the time for a good price and they work well for me.
Great photos, great lens
Glad you like them!
Very well covered. There are definitely benefits of MFT and Olympus/OM-SYSTEM over other sensor sizes and brands.
1. Price. Most equivalent local lengths of other OEM brands are twice the price. Most 3rd party lenses are manual focus only, at the same price.
2. Many lenses don't have the focus limiters & 1:1 switches.
3. It is double the DoF to the equivalent focal length
4. Not only it's 2:1, you would need to have at least a 40mp full frame sensor to be able to crop in to a 2:1 equivalent and have double your f/stop. You could however get a full frame 2:1 lens but the closer you get to the subject, the shallower the DoF will become. You would end up needing to do some focus stacking.
5. Focus bracketing and stacking on the E-M5/OM-5 and E-M1/OM-1 is amazing. I'm able to get and eight frame in-camera focus stack jpegs hand held. Other people can do more.
6. Incredible IBIS that will help improve your focus stack success as long as you don't accidentally move towards the subject when it is stacking.
7. Bracketing and stacking will automatically sync with both Olympus and Godox flash units so you don't have to worry about recharge times in the menu.
I use the E-M5 Mark III w/60mm, Godox TT-350 & Cygnustech diffuser. You can find me on Instagram @RobShootPhotos
Shameless plug. 😁
All excellent points Rob. One thing though, on point four it’s an even bigger difference. The 2-1 factor (double the width of the sensor, double the height) is actually equivalent to 4 times the resolution to get the same effect so a 20Mp MFT equates to an 80Mp to get a 2-1 magnification. So MFT is even better in that respect.
The lens hood issue is silly, I agree... I enjoyed your review and appreciate the information you shared, for I am researching which glass will be best for macro work (something I haven't played with in probably a decade) and my E-M1X.
Check out the newer 90mm macro from OMDS, I have not had the opportunity to play with one yet but it looks truly awesome
@@ThatMicro43Guy I was looking at the 90mm on B&H's site, in fact, immediately after watching your vid. The 2:1 magnification was particularly appealing. I'm leaning towards finding one over the winter (used in 9 or 9+ condition knocks prices down substantially) since most of my desired macro subjects are already disappearing with the imminent arrival of the first cold snaps and freezes here in North Dakota. Thanks for the input and the no-nonsense review.
Another point about this lens. I was curious about full frame macro lenses after this video. I looked for Sony full frame figuring that is representative full frame, macro lenses of which I saw two; 1 is a 105 mm. The other is a 90 mm both of these lenses weigh about a pound and a half and neither have quite the reach of this little gem usually when I am out shooting macro of insects and like I just can’t imagine trying to one-hand the camera with a pound and a half hunk of glass sitting on it as many times I may have a flash or something in my other hand. This little lens is just another league of size. There’s no way for what I like to do with going out and taking handheld insect shots for example, that I want to do this with one of those 1.5 pound behemoths. That is about four times as heavy as this little guy and you lose a little bit of reach!
Thanks!
Thank you for supporting the channel Mary
Brian I just watched this feature, I have a 30mm Panasonic micro lens and you are quite right about having to get very near, however I have found using it as a general prime the picture quality in superb and have sold my 25mm 1.7 which is half the price and in my opinion not as good. ps the 30mm lens is also sold with no lens hood.
Yes, I use that one too, most of the time when using MFT. The 30mm macro is sharp edge to edge, right from wide-open, and without a hood on seems to have no flare problems. It is also made in Japan. Nice! I am less happy with the 25mm f1.7 as it is not always focusing correctly. When it does, it is OK, but still not the quality of the 30mm Lumix, with no distortion, sharp across the frame at all apertures one will use.
With the Bokeh, you can definitely tell the difference. Shoot the 40-150 f/2.8 at 60mm and the 60mm Macro side by side where you can create some bokeh balls. You will notice, depending how close you are to the subject, the macro lens will look more octagon. I love the looks of it.
Danke!
Thanks for the support Martin
Funny, I thought you where using a different lens, since you have the lens hood reversed on it. Mine also did not come with a lens hood, and they should 1euro. I use mine for photographing jewelry for sale on ebay mostly. Thanks.
I’m using my 60 mm on a Olympus OM-D-M5 Mark lll but when using in camera bracketing I am getting a halo on the final shot. Any idea what is causing this? Thanks.
By bracketing I presume you refer to focus bracketing?
Only thing I can think of is that the camera or the subject have movement between shots. Are you using a tripod (and if so is it a good sturdy one?) or are you taking photos of a subject where it could be affected by wind?.
You could also reduce the number of photos taken in the bracket.
@@ThatMicro43Guy Thank you for replying. I always use a tripod as I’m a still life photographer. It’s good. I usually take 10 shots maybe I’ll reduce it to 6 and see if that helps. Thanks.
I picked one up for $250 2nd hand
Hi Brian. Greetings from the "Sunny Coast" Queensland AUSTRALIA....mate :-) Sub'd straight in. Good stuff. Thank you. Have a bloody good day.
Thanks Mick, a bloody good day to you too mate. Welcome to the channel.
I’ve done better with out a macro lens