Crazy to sell the Olympus 12-40mm?!

momomonster wrote:

I had the exact same dilemma (if that's the correct word to use in the first place) as you. The only difference is that I started off with the em5 II + kit lens, i.e. with the 14-150mm II. Eventually I bought the 12-40mm and sold the 14-150mm. 2 main reasons:

Image quality: The image quality of the kit lens is observably inferior relative to the 12-40mm. I retook the exact same shots with both lenses and compared it side by side. The difference is really quite noticeable. I'm no photography expert here and cant really explain to you with those technical terms, but hopefully you can keep the pro lens and compare it for yourself.

Aperture:The biggest downside that I personally feel for the kit lens is the rather slow speed, which doesn't make it as ideal as the ONLY walk around lens especially since the em5 II (and other olympus cameras as well) cant handle low light that well. You will definitely find the extra stopping down of light useful on the 12-40mm

For the other features, its pretty much comparable - weight, size, weather sealing, focus speed. Though I must admit the pro lens looks nicely aesthetically - which is quite subjective.

Even though the kit lens has a much better zoom range, I find myself not using the extreme end of it (>100mm) at all, especially during street photography. Partly because you wont really have the chance to do so in a city setting, and more so because the image quality will be compromised. I would rather walk up slightly more to the subject and take the shot, provided the subject is still around.

Hopefully you can keep us updated of your choice! I was kind of disappointed at the lack of reviews for the kit lens. No doubt its a very new lens, but given that it isn't that outstanding on paper, it somehow felt that hardly anyone will review it in the near future. I'm quite sure there will be tonnes of reviews within a month of the release of the 7-14mm pro, but that's another topic altogether.

Haha! Interesting you had the opposite journey to me. I guess I'll give them both a go, I'll post again on this thread with my choice in the end and a few pictures with the setup. I agree it has been very difficult to find reviews / samples of the 14-150 online! But I went ahead with the order as it was a very good price.

Cheers!