Rachael and I wandered through London Drugs waiting for our movie to start the other night. Took a brief look at Micro Four Thirds (aka m43) cameras again.

London Drugs had the Olympus PEN E-PM1 on sale for only $399. It's definitely a "lower end" camera. Rachael and I had talked about maybe buying a kit together. This one was cheap enough to just get going with an m43 system: we can still buy a different body and share lenses, or add more lenses.

It was time to just pick something. I've done some experimenting yesterday and today, and I'm happy with the purchase.

The image / link at the top goes to the dpreview entry for the E-PM1. If you go to the Conclusion page, you can compare to other cameras in the same class. Everything gets very close to the same rating, and the price I paid for the E-PM1 makes it the best price / performance.

Here's to more mindful photography in 2012.

This is the camera that Roland has shortlisted to buy.

The last time I wrote about this was back in March, where I was really determined to get one with an electronic viewfinder (EVF). Now, I'm thinking I should suck it up and go for the most compact model I can find.

Back when I was using Quora, I also spent some time gardening the Micro Four Thirds topic, which has lots of useful information.

The Panasonic LVF-1 Electronic View Finder (EVF)  is awkward - The Panasonic GF1 is a beautiful compact camera and the add-on EVF makes it bulkier.  The EVF is useful, especially in bright light, but I did not care for it because of the additional bulk and its low resolution.  If I do use an EVF, it will be on another m43 body such as the Panasonic G2 or Panasonic GH2 which both have high resolution, built-in EVF's.

The Olympus looks cooler and is more compact, but only has an add on viewfinder.

The Panasonic G2 / GF2 have a built-in viewfinder, which may just be the thing that tips the balance for me.