Not as nice as I expected.

[bigtomjp]

So I spent a week with this camera and it is not really worth the money in my opinion.

Price: If it were priced $100 less I would have felt it was a fair price considering the Sony TX I previously used took better photos and is priced much lower. It was still less than the waterproof case for the EM1.

Yes its is water proof, no big deal there. It is bigger and clunkier than other similar cameras.

You cannot buy extra batteries and charge them in a wall charger. Charges only in camera. Not exciting.

The glass on the lens has no cover. This leads to fingerprints and sunscreen and other things making a huge impact on your photos. There is a large amount of light bleeding if the glass is not very clean.

The glass on the back is very difficult to clean and it can be very hard to simply frame a shot when only 1-2m underwater even with the brightness turned all the way up. Same issues in a sunny outdoor area. If the screen is not very clean you will have a very hard time to see the digital display.

When using the Olympus float strap and swimming about the mode dial frequently changes settings. This really defeats the sense of a point and shoot camera as the mode dial needs to be confirmed every time you take a photo.

Whenever you change the mode the flash defaults back to Auto and that will need to reset as well if you are in a setting where you want the flash off. This was extremely annoying.

The auto focus frequently finds odd things to lock onto and you get bad photos. When using Auto mode and the camera decides it is going to use F2.0 stuff gets blurry. There seems to be no way to fix this other than getting the camera to focus properly with a half press on the shutter and then re-framing the shot to continue with a full shutter press.

Video focusing was very slow. I would not advise using this camera for video.

RAW is not available in all modes.

I would say 50% of the photos it took were decent and 20% of those were actually good. Wish I had just used the TX30 or my GoPro4, but they have their own usability issues.

The menus were there most confusing of any Olympus I have used.

For the flagship Tough camera I was let down.

 

[Greynerd]

The glass on the lens has no cover. This leads to fingerprints and sunscreen and other things making a huge impact on your photos. There is a large amount of light bleeding if the glass is not very clean.

Wipe it clean with your t shirt. Nor worries about coatings etc. That is the whole idea. Try getting sunscreen off the actual lens coating or lens protector aperture blades.

I would say 50% of the photos it took were decent and 20% of those were actually good. Wish I had just used the TX30 or my GoPro4, but they have their own usability issues.

I suspect you are not really satisfied with any camera, I am sure the TG-4 is worth more than one * which rates it as virtually useless. Methinks you protest too much.

 

[Michael Meissner]

Note, I don't own a TG-4, but I do own a TG-2 (I got a TG-4 for my daughter for her birthday, but I haven't used it, but the TG-1/2/3/4 all share accessories).

You cannot buy extra batteries and charge them in a wall charger. Charges only in camera. Not exciting.

There are third party wall chargers you can get.

The glass on the lens has no cover. This leads to fingerprints and sunscreen and other things making a huge impact on your photos. There is a large amount of light bleeding if the glass is not very clean.

You can get a CLA-T01 adapter (which is normally used to mount the telephoto lens) and clip on a 40.5mm lens cap if you would prefer to keep the lens protected.

 

[CAcreeks]

Thanks for the review.

You did not mention that the charging cord is not standard miniUSB or microUSB. Who needs yet another USB cable lying on a shelf, getting confused with other ones? Not me.

All the same, I might buy one when weather gets warmer and the river start flowing.

So I spent a week with this camera and it is not really worth the money in my opinion.

Price: If it were priced $100 less I would have felt it was a fair price considering the Sony TX I previously used took better photos and is priced much lower. It was still less than the waterproof case for the EM1.

Yes its is water proof, no big deal there. It is bigger and clunkier than other similar cameras.

You cannot buy extra batteries and charge them in a wall charger. Charges only in camera. Not exciting.

The glass on the lens has no cover. This leads to fingerprints and sunscreen and other things making a huge impact on your photos. There is a large amount of light bleeding if the glass is not very clean.

The glass on the back is very difficult to clean and it can be very hard to simply frame a shot when only 1-2m underwater even with the brightness turned all the way up. Same issues in a sunny outdoor area. If the screen is not very clean you will have a very hard time to see the digital display.

When using the Olympus float strap and swimming about the mode dial frequently changes settings. This really defeats the sense of a point and shoot camera as the mode dial needs to be confirmed every time you take a photo.

Whenever you change the mode the flash defaults back to Auto and that will need to reset as well if you are in a setting where you want the flash off. This was extremely annoying.

The auto focus frequently finds odd things to lock onto and you get bad photos. When using Auto mode and the camera decides it is going to use F2.0 stuff gets blurry. There seems to be no way to fix this other than getting the camera to focus properly with a half press on the shutter and then re-framing the shot to continue with a full shutter press.

Video focusing was very slow. I would not advise using this camera for video.

RAW is not available in all modes.

I would say 50% of the photos it took were decent and 20% of those were actually good. Wish I had just used the TX30 or my GoPro4, but they have their own usability issues.

The menus were there most confusing of any Olympus I have used.

For the flagship Tough camera I was let down.

 

[rmalbers]

You know that connector is used for more than just charging right? (see page 76 of the ENG manual)

 

[CAcreeks]

You know that connector is used for more than just charging right? (see page 76 of the ENG manual)

Olympus should be able to do all that with a regular mini-USB or micro-USB connector.

My Samsung tablet can charge, exchange data, and add peripherals using its micro-USB port.

 

[Greynerd]

Not exactly a show stopper is it though? Samsung have sorted out the the plug but instead have scrapped the camera to plug it in to so Olympus have better priorities I would think.

You know that connector is used for more than just charging right? (see page 76 of the ENG manual)

Olympus should be able to do all that with a regular mini-USB or micro-USB connector.

My Samsung tablet can charge, exchange data, and add peripherals using its micro-USB port.

 

[rmalbers]

That plug is also used for Analog Audio and video output, that's the difference, (note analog, not digital signals).

 

[Porteral]

You can get a Watson wall charger for this battery. Check the B&H site for this camera under accessories. You might have to do a little searching around, but I ordered the Watson when I bought the camera, for just this reason. Now I have a spare battery, and I don't have to plug in the camera just to charge the depleted one....just pop in a new battery, and go.

 

[CAcreeks]

That plug is also used for Analog Audio and video output, that's the difference, (note analog, not digital signals).

Why would I want this, or need this?

We have not had an analog TV in many years, and that was our last analog device. In the US, the FCC mandated switchover to digital TV in 2006.

All our phones use standard micro USB so we have charging cables in every room and vehicle.

That said, I will probably buy a TG-4 this spring. There really isn't a better choice at this time.

 

[Michael Meissner]

That plug is also used for Analog Audio and video output, that's the difference, (note analog, not digital signals).

Why would I want this, or need this?

If you want to do remote video while shooting, this was the only option on most Olympus cameras until Olympus started adding wifi support. It is fairly easy to add a remote monitor if the camera is some distance away from where you are shooting, or you can't conveniently see the screen. For example, on the TG-4 you might want to have the camera on a pole above your head. Unfortunatley, since the camera doesn't support the wired shutter release, you will need something mechanical to press the shutter (I've modded a film shutter release to do this for one of my cameras). For example, this video shows how to make a pole camera: pole camera howto

However, whether you can use the wifi support for remote viewing is a different question. I had bought an Olympus AIR-01 (which ONLY uses wifi viewing), and I had to return it because I could not keep up a connection to my Samsung smart phone.

We have not had an analog TV in many years, and that was our last analog device. In the US, the FCC mandated switchover to digital TV in 2006.

For the home use yes, but analog video monitors are still used for instance in third party car backup systems.

All our phones use standard micro USB so we have charging cables in every room and vehicle.

Unfortunately, Olympus long ago moved away from standard cables. However, at least it tends to use the same cables for cameras in the same class.

That said, I will probably buy a TG-4 this spring. There really isn't a better choice at this time.