Steve Heath
Well-known member
Raided my savings and part-exchanged my Zuiko 300mm Pro for the 150 - 400mm. Still squirming with guilt over £6799. Here’s a (very) brief amateur review. Much more comprehensive reviews are widely available. This is aimed at those who are put off by the price.
Build quality is excellent. It reminds me of my old second hand Canon 500mm F4. As solid and durable but much, much lighter. At 1.875 Kg it’s a whopper in micro 4/3 terms, but comfortable to hold and carry around for a day. Image stabilisation is impressive with 8 steps of compensation. This allowed me to shoot hand-held for a few minutes at a time with short rests between. Autofocus is ultra fast making this a great bird photography lens. The zoom ring is smooth and easy to adjust, especially with the lens on a tripod/monopod or beanbag. Image quality is comparable with the 300mm Pro, an observation based on field photography of birds rather than a formal comparison using test cards, even with the built in TC engaged. The 300-1000mm FF equivalent reach makes this one of the most versatile wildlife lenses on the market. The micro 4/3 will always limit the lens performance when compared to FF primes super telephotos. The high iso required for low light shooting (e.g. in woodland) does degrade the IQ. This can be largely rectified post processing, but I’m not fond of this side of things, preferring to shoot Jpeg and process minimally at home. The OM 300mm pro is a great birding lens in nearly every respect. But I wanted greater reach and the flexibility of a zoom. Were these advantages worth an extra £4400? Short answer - no! But am I glad I got the lens. Definitely. It is the best all round bird lens I have ever used and half the price of a ff prime with much greater flexibility. This lens is not a necessity - there are plenty of cheaper lens on the mirrorless market that will give comparable performance, albeit over a shorter focal length.
Build quality is excellent. It reminds me of my old second hand Canon 500mm F4. As solid and durable but much, much lighter. At 1.875 Kg it’s a whopper in micro 4/3 terms, but comfortable to hold and carry around for a day. Image stabilisation is impressive with 8 steps of compensation. This allowed me to shoot hand-held for a few minutes at a time with short rests between. Autofocus is ultra fast making this a great bird photography lens. The zoom ring is smooth and easy to adjust, especially with the lens on a tripod/monopod or beanbag. Image quality is comparable with the 300mm Pro, an observation based on field photography of birds rather than a formal comparison using test cards, even with the built in TC engaged. The 300-1000mm FF equivalent reach makes this one of the most versatile wildlife lenses on the market. The micro 4/3 will always limit the lens performance when compared to FF primes super telephotos. The high iso required for low light shooting (e.g. in woodland) does degrade the IQ. This can be largely rectified post processing, but I’m not fond of this side of things, preferring to shoot Jpeg and process minimally at home. The OM 300mm pro is a great birding lens in nearly every respect. But I wanted greater reach and the flexibility of a zoom. Were these advantages worth an extra £4400? Short answer - no! But am I glad I got the lens. Definitely. It is the best all round bird lens I have ever used and half the price of a ff prime with much greater flexibility. This lens is not a necessity - there are plenty of cheaper lens on the mirrorless market that will give comparable performance, albeit over a shorter focal length.
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