Olympus Professional Lens Roundup

As the original mirrorless system, Micro Four-Thirds has grown in popularity and offers the most native lenses of any mirrorless system. Founding members Olympus and Panasonic produce the bulk of these, yet third-party makers have joined. The entire family spans focal-lengths from 7 to 400mm, equivalent to 14-800mm, which covers almost any photographic need. Adaptors allow access to an even greater range of lenses.

Given that the principal aim of a mirrorless system is to be small, most manufacturers started with compact light-weight lenses - with the exception of Fuji which launched its mirrorless system towards professionals. Five years ago we published a round up covering the initial 6 Olympus Micro Four-Thirds lenses. With more cameras designed for enthusiasts and professionals, high-end lenses were recently introduced to the family, with most of them being weather-sealed to match a handful of professional weatherproof cameras.

In this feature article we review seven such offerings from Olympus:

• M.Zuiko 7-14mm F/2.8 PRO - Fully weatherproof lens with an extremely wide angle-of-view.
• M.Zuiko 12-40mm F/2.8 PRO - Covers ultra-wide to normal focal-lengths and is also fully weatherproof.
• M.Zuiko 12-45mm F/4 PRO - Incredibly compact general purpose zoom covering ultra-wide to short telephoto in a weatherproof body.
• M.Zuiko 12-100mm F/4 IS PRO - Covers ultra-wide to short telephoto with a constant aperture in a weatherproof body with optical image stabilization.
• M.Zuiko 40-150mm F/2.8 PRO - Bright standard to telephoto zoom within a fully weatherproof body.
• M.Zuiko 8mm F/1.8 PRO - Professional grade fisheye lens with the brightest aperture for a fisheye of any brand or lens mount. It is even weatherproof.
• M.Zuiko 25mm F/1.2 PRO - Ultra-bright 50mm-equivalent lens with hybrid focus ring and weatherproof body.

They have three more M.Zuiko PRO lenses not covered in this roundup, the M.Zuiko 300mm F/4 IS PRO, the M.Zuiko 17mm F/1.2 PRO and M.Zuiko 45mm F/1.2 PRO which is the brightest fisheye of any brand or lens mount. Interestingly two of these lenses are stabilized, which is not necessary for Olympus lenses since all their mirrorless cameras are stabilized. With the latest technological achievements though, in-lens stabilization can improve total stability.

The above links lead to the specification page of each lens. Each next page in this Olympus Professional Lens roundup describes one of these lenses in more details along with a analysis of its optical performance. Click on the Next button to advance or use the menu below it to jump to a specific lens.