Which Oly Macro: 50mm or 60mm?

I do a lot of macro work, so I have tried the 50mm, 60mm and the PL 45mm. My particular feeling about these lenses may be a little different than some others, but I ended up with the PL 45mm, which I think has beautiful IQ.

When I tried the 50mm on the EM1, I was surprised at how slow and noisy the AF was, and I just did not see much of a difference between it and either the 60mm or my old adapted Nikon 55mm f3.5 macro (which is a heck of a good lens). In addition, since the AF is so slow and so noisy, you have to use manual focus on the lens, which would be fine, except since it is focus-by-wire, it does not have that lovely snappy precision of a fully manual lens (like my Nikon). Needless to say, it did not stay.

The 60mm is a nice lens, but when I got it, after comparing it with the adapted legacy Nikon, I simply could not see any IQ difference; if anything I like the Nikon output better. I even tried two copies of it, just in case I had a bad one, and the results were the same.

This year I ended up springing for the PL 45mm f2.8 macro, and was actually delighted with it. It has beautiful IQ, and it's the first macro lens I've use on M43 that trumps the adapted Nikon in image quality. It's not weather sealed though.

So, given all of this, what I would recommend (based on my own experiences and what you want), is the Oly 60mm. IF you can live without weather sealing, I would strongly consider the PL45mm, and IF you plan to use MF a fair bit of the time (and can live without AF or weather sealing), I would look into one of the Nikon macros.

-J