Olympus....times they are a changin'

Looks like Four Thirds Rumours Website is cooking up something about the new Olympus dslr's or at least a new 4/3rds product anyway.  Interesting, but I can't really picture how a modular camera would work.  Guess I'm not thinking outside the box.  I'll definitely be following along, but knowing Olympus it will be innovative if nothing else.

Looks like the well known pro Kirk Tuck is being forced to move away from Olympus to a Canon 5D mk II.  I know how he feels, but like him I plan on keeping my foot in both camps.  Possibly Olympus for me will be more of a rainy day only camera for pro work and a hobby camera for personal use, but only time will tell.  It can be both a pain and a relief to run different systems.  The good thing is that you have the right tool for different tasks.  The bad thing is that it is expensive, leads to owning too much gear to carry around, insure and maintain, and it can lead to confusion as you are always using two different systems that operate and behave completely differently.

Photo Magazines on iPad

So I have been exploring using my shiny new iPad for reading some photography magazines and one of the first ones I tried was 'Digital Photographer' as they have an App right in the App Store.  I'd never read the magazine before but it reminded me a lot of Popular Photography.  What I like about it is that you can buy and download magazines directly to your iPad for reading later offline.  They sit in a virtual bookshelf ready for you to browse through when you wish much like the iBook application.  Once in the magazine it is sharp and easy to read and navigate and you can even zoom in on small captions etc.  Reading magazines on the iPad is a pleasure for sure.  What I don't like is the price at $4.99 an issue or $26.99 for 6 months or $54.99 for 12 months.  To me, if I'm going to pay for a digital subscription I want a discount over the paper copy that they have to print and mail to me.  A mailed subscription to Canada is $126 so it is a discount, but still too pricey in my mind for a virtual copy.  Maybe I'm just cheap.  The experience of reading the magazine may make it worth it to some.  On a side note, my opinion may be coloured by the fact that I found the magazine to be a bit too generalistic for my tastes.  Because it appeals to the same crowd as Popular Photography I think it is geared mainly at enthusiasts and interested amateurs, which is great, but for me I flipped idly through most of the magazine with only minor interest.  This is why I cancelled my subscription to Popular Photography a year ago.  I don't need to read what a wide angle lens is or the meaning of a histogram..... again.  So take my opinion with a grain of salt, the magazine may not be for me.  In contrast I did pay for a subscription to 'Professional Photographer' magazine, but at $20 a year I found it a good deal.  The biggest pitfall is that you have to read the issues online, you can't download them to your iPad, which is a big shame.  So, maybe I'm being hard on the Digital Photographer magazine, at least they give you a downloadable copy and have a great interface.

I had another photo session yesterday in the rain (thats me in the photo above working yesterday, image taken by my partner with his weather sealed Pentax K20D and newly repaired lens) when out I noticed that my remote cable cap on my E3 was missing.  I remembered that I had taken it off last week when I did some architectural photos on a tripod with my remote. I think I threw the cap in my jeans pocket which is a bad habit of mine.  The remote actually has a spot on it to attach the cap so you don't lose it, but I'm a dork and get in a hurry sometimes and don't do things right.  I'm a bit irritated by the design of the caps on the E3.  I wish they were simple attached rubber caps that hung on the body when removed.  I really rely on my E3 being weather sealed, it is the main purpose of me keeping the camera, so the now exposed metal cable port is probably not a good thing.  I went on Ebay searching for an inexpensive replacement, but the only guy selling one wanted $5 for the cap and $10 for shipping.  That is the thing about Ebay.  Often times they make their profit on jacked up shipping charges.  This little 4mm cap can simply be dropped in a letter envelope for 50 cents.  So I went on Olympus' actual site and ordered it for $7 plus $3 for shipping.  That ten dollar mistake will hopefully teach me to be more careful next time.  At least I had fun on the shoot.  It took me a while to get into it, but we made the most of a day that threatened rain and even found a new location (you see me in it above) that is our new favourite.

iPad Lovin'

Well, turns out I didn't need much to convince my wife that we should get an iPad.  I had already pre-scouted out the stores that were going to have stock.  Friday morning, the release day, I casually mentioned to my lovely understanding partner that this was the day that they were released and the lineups would probably be crazy.  "You should get in line for one" she said.  "Pardon," said I.  "Yeah, that would be cool" she says.  OK, I'm not one to jump to conclusions but that sounded like permission.  Even better than permission, it sounded like a guilt free geeky shopping trip.  So I gobbled down breakfast, dropped my kid at school (don't worry, I didn't make my eight year old jump out of a moving vehicle), and booted it to London Drugs expecting a huge lineup.

I get to London Drugs and...there is nobody there, and still 10 minutes before they open.  I go sit by the doors and watch the staff all walk in for their shifts, trying to look indifferent and not too geeky/desperate I stare at my iPhone and keep my head down.  Once the big metal doors open I casually get up and start walking, and then I notice a middle aged woman going in ahead of me!  She is heading to the back where the computer department is!  I quickly take a shortcut through the TV's and zip past her with visions of having to 'accidentally' knock her on her ass as a last resort.  Turns out she was going in for the photo lab or something.  Whew, dodged a bullet there.  I get back to the computers and there are no staff, but there is a big new shiny iPad display.  Two guys peek out at me through the computer service window and I, as nonchalantly as I can say "so, um, got any iPad's in stock?"  The gig was up.  They were onto me and I was quickly identified as an early adopting, froth at the mouth full-on nerd.  But to my relief, they were just as nerdy.   But they had bad news for me.  All they had in stock were the 16gb models.  I wanted the big daddy 64 gb.  I knew Best Buy opened one hour after London Drugs, so knowing that there was no love where I was I ditched those guys faster than a dog can eat bacon.

I whipped my car over to Best Buy (it is so close I could have walked faster) and did the gangster drive by.  There was a line!  One person sitting in a lawn chair in front.  This was going to be a cake walk.  I thought I even had time to go through the McDonald's drive through for an Egg McMuffin and a coffee so I did.  I even ate the sandwich in the car before walking up to the store.  By now there were two people in front of me, the original lady and and old guy with a walker.  I knew I could take both of them if need be, but I put on my friendly face.  "So which iPad are you guys going for?"  "The 3G one" they both say.   Golden!  I want the 64 gb Wifi one.  I'm feeling mighty confident now and I immediately go on my iPhone and update my Facebook status to "about to buy an iPad."  I get tons of "you are a neeeeerd" responses. 

After the Best Buy staff come out and hand out papers giving us an order we can buy in (there are a grand total of four of us at the front doors) and show us a basket of cool accessories we can get.  I have my mind made up on the external keyboard and a folding case that looks like a book and as soon as the doors open I run in and make my purchase and run out in about 5 minutes.  I race home and plug it into my iMac and get it rolling.  It comes fully charged so I can rock it right away.  It is shiny, it is cool, I'm in love.  

         

And so, that is my iPad story.  I have read from lots of photographers and heard on a few of the podcasts I listen to like 'This Week in Photography' that this is going to revolutionize the way photographers work.  I kinda thought they were just being goofy.  After all, it is just a tablet.  And sure enough, most of the things talked about had little to do with photography (as has my post so far right?).  So here, after being an owner for about 30 hours are my initial thoughts:

Non-Photography stuff:  This thing is awesome.  Literally I can sincerely say that this single device is very likely to change the way the world consumes newspapers, books and magazines.  I plan on cancelling my paper subscription to the newspaper on Monday and letting some of my paper magazine subscriptions lapse.  As for books, well, I'm a hard core book lover and I will always buy paper books however for trashy fiction novels (for me that is either zombie or baseball books) I don't really see the need to buy a paper copy that I will just give away when I'm done.  I'll download it, read it on a device that is what I figure to be the perfect reading tool.  It is about the size of a medium sized book, is easy on the eyes, isn't heavy and can be read in bed.  I'll keep buying my photography and reference books in paper because that is how I want to consume them, but mark my words, there are about to be a lot of trees that will live now when these things and devices like them become widespread in use.  The device is going to largely replace our aging family laptop.  It misses some things, like the mail program is a little too simple, it doesn't allow flash browsing on the internet, and can be tiring to type on if you don't have the keyboard I bought, but it is comfortable and useful for 99% of the stuff we do on a laptop.  My wife read a book in bed last night on it, and sat on the couch today and surfed recipes online.  I read a photography magazine, surfed my regular blogs and forums and browsed through the App store.  I do plan on restraining myself from buying a million dollars worth of useless apps I will later delete as I did when I bought my iPhone.

Photography Stuff:  I always found the photography apps pretty useless on the iPhone.  However there was one I liked called Photobuddy which had a great exposure calculator in it.  I never got into all the photo developing apps on it and I don't plan on clogging my iPad with them.  Photo editing will be done on my 24" iMac thank-you very much.  What I am excited about with this device is taking it with me to meet clients and to display my work.  This thing shows photos beautifully.  It is sharp, bright and colourful and images just pop off the screen.  The iPhone was useless for this, much too small.  The iPad can be held and looked at like a nice book, and it makes your images sing.  I also put some of our slideshow videos on it and they look amazing as well.  So when I meet a bride or client for the first time I can show them our photobooks which are cool, but now I plan on showing them my iPad portfolio as well and I know that it will have a wow factor.  

              

There is a camera connector kit that I plan on getting as well, and I can see that at some point there will be tethered shooting as well.  It is just logical, and would be amazing for that.  I also threw all my contracts and information forms on the iPad in pdf form so now I can email them to the client directly while still sitting with them in a meeting.  So basically it isn't a photo tool, but it is a great photo presentation device that ups your game with your clients.  And I don't care that it doesn't have a camera.  Despite what Chase Jarvis says, I never found my iPhone to be my 'Best Camera' and only used it to photograph things I saw in stores or other such stuff that I needed to remember.  To me, the quality of the camera was terrible.  

That's it, done.  I love it.  Go buy one.  You know you want one.  :)

To wrap up, I just wanted to point out a couple of other blog posts I read recently.  One is the Scott Kelby post about his photo challenge.  I don't usually do these things, but this one is tempting.  Taping up the lcd screen on my camera and going old school sounds fun.  I encourage everyone to check it out, and it is tied to a great charity.  

Also, this post on the Online Photographer blog has gone pretty much viral so I wasn't even going to mention it, but in case you have been living under a rock for the past couple of days I thought I would point it out.  It is hilarious.  You will see some of yourself in here, I did, so prepare to make fun of yourself.  

And that is it.  I made up a photography session today that was cancelled last week as the client was sick so that made me happy.  We found a really great new location too, which is always exciting.  In a bid to keep my love for paper books up, my daughter and I are off now to Chapters to grab a new book and hang out with each other.  It is some of our favourite time together, hanging out in book stores, grabbing a hot chocolate and talking.  That is one thing the iPad will never be able to replace.

Edit:  So what did I buy at Chapters that was tree worthy?  Instead of a book, I grabbed three fine art photo magazines.  I love them, love looking at them in print and on paper.  I bought GUP, B&W, and Silvershotz.  I also saw Professional Photographer magazine but didn't feel the need to have that in paper.  You can get it digitally for much cheaper and that is a good candidate for reading on the iPad.  My daughter bought a chapter book.  Like me, big reader.

Another Edit:  Just was flipping through the B&W magazine.  Wow, Greg Mettler's work is blowing my mind.  Give me the heeby jeebies at the same time it keeps me looking.

Pentax Service

So my partner in crime at Vivid Photography and I both have moved to Canon, but we have our loyalties and hearts with our original brands of cameras, Olympus for me and Pentax for him.  I sent an E3 in for repair and cleaning last year and was pretty happy with the service I recieved (it had a broken cable release thingamajigger) from them.

Last week we sent in a broken Pentax lens.  It was the 50-135 f2.8 lens that is rather notorious for having its SDM motor break.  Well this one broke.  Anyway, sent it to Pentax last Monday and received it back this Tuesday fixed under warranty.  Thats an eight day turnaround over a long weekend.  Pretty good if you ask me.  Too bad the SDM motor is so unreliable.

We plan on keeping the Pentax and Olympus for rainy day work.  They are great for outdoor events, especially those drizzly day weddings so it is nice that he has his only weather sealed Pentax lens back and working.  As for Canon, we are considering joining Canon Professional Services (you have to pay) so that we can make sure we get our gear back quickly and have access to loaner gear during the busy wedding season.  It's too bad that you have to pay with Canon for the kind of service you get for free from Olympus or Pentax but I guess such a large company doesn't need to work too hard to keep us happy.  They have plenty of other customers.

Speaking of Pentax.  They perplex me.  After todays big rumour that they might be getting bought out by Sony or Canon (everyone knows Hoya hasn't been successful making money with them since they acquired them) I am just not understanding how this company can be such a money drain with what appears to be a huge hit in the Pentax Kx dslr.  The K7 was great, but it wasn't going to sell a lot until it was discounted.  The Kx though seems to be flying off the shelves.  Pentax seems smart too in limiting the number of dslr's it has to support on the market with only two.  While Pentax isn't a huge innovator in my mind as compared to Olympus, they certainly have come up with some nice features lately in their dslr's like being the first with in camera hdr (K7) and the sensor shift feature that allows for moving the actual sensor to shift an image over without moving your tripod.  They also put some neat LED lights around the lens of their latest waterproof point and shoot (W90) which must be pretty cool for macro work.  Also, the great (and in my opinion industry best) selection of awesome primes available to Pentax photographers is to be envied.  I wish Olympus had near the interest in primes as Pentax did.  So with all this good news, why is this company the hot potato? Why is it always in the rumour mill as being shopped around?  I'm actually asking.  It makes no sense to me why it doesn't present itself as a profitable company to own.

I'll end this with a quick photo that I did on Monday with the 11-22 lens I talked about in this post.  I don't really do a lot of architectural photography, but I enjoyed the new challenge.  I'm sure the client will like the colour versions a lot, but they really sing in black and white to me.  The lens was fun to use and the 22mm equivalent wide angle was great in tight rooms on the inside of the home.  I used it in preference to the 24mm of the 24-70 lens I own on the 5D as that extra 2mm of wide angle really makes a difference.  No shoots for me until Saturday now, so I think I'll just relax and maybe take my film camera for a stroll.

Processed in Photomatix then in Silver Effex Pro.  Noise (I always see noise in hdr images) reduced in Dfine 2.0 from Nik Software.  Final adjustments in Lightroom.

iPad, EPL-1, Busted Shoots and Lost on Lost

What a week.  I had one shoot cancelled on Saturday due to the client having the flu, then thought I had another last Saturday, but had put it in my iPhone wrong (it is this Saturday), then had a successful shoot Sunday for the newspaper and had my second portrait session on Sunday cancelled as that client had the flu too!  Had a great session on Monday doing architectural photos which isn't really something I've done much of, then a session on Tuesday cancelled as the client was called into work.  Tonight, couldn't photograph for my Parks and Recreation project as the children's permission forms hadn't been completed.  Talk about ups and downs!

So to console myself I worked my angles trying to talk my wife into the idea that we need an iPad which comes out in Canada in two days.  I went to London Drugs and Best Buy to see if they were getting stock (they are) and I'm considering lining up for one on Friday.  I've convinced myself that this is a great item to own, not only for my family, but for me to take on meetings with potential clients to show our work.

Also, I've been really nurturing the idea of getting a micro-four thirds camera.  I sold my LX3 so I'm left without a highly capable small camera.  I find myself in limbo though as the most appealing camera for me right now is the Olympus EP-2 which I still think is about $200 too expensive.  I played with the Panasonic GF-1 and the Olympus EPL-1 in the store tonight and the Olympus doesn't really impress me except for the little flash that you can use to bounce off the ceiling and control external flashes.  It has a tiny screen, no included viewfinder and I could care less about the kit lens.  Also, it has no front and rear scroll wheels.  The GF-1 had one scroll wheel at least and I loved its 20mm f1.7 kit pancake lens, but I'm so tired of no in body image stabilization in cameras.  Also, despite a big beautiful screen it didn't come with the viewfinder either and parts of it didn't feel great or well built.

I know Sony has the new NEX camera out, but I'm sure we won't see those in stores for a while.  Samsung isn't exactly well known for mass distribution of their products so I don't know if we'll ever see their NX10.  I never did see one of their Pentax clone dslr's in a store.  I think I'll take another look at the EP-2, but at this point I'm wondering if this type of camera isn't ready for me yet, or maybe I'm not ready for it.  There is too much in a dslr that I'd miss at this point despite my deep craving for a smaller lighter camera.  I loved my LX3, but the shooting from an lcd screen never warmed my photographic heart.  Tony on the Random Photographer Blog just reviewed his new EPL-1.  I enjoyed his observations, so check it out if you are interested.

So, I have two sessions planned for Saturday and I've rescheduled tonights missed session for next week.  I'm sure I'll make up all my lost sessions which is great.  I've caught up on most of my processing and I don't have another wedding booked until June.  July and August are shaping up to be crazy busy months so this is the antsy time before the storm.  We are pushing hard trying to build relationships with venues and other vendors to get our brand more deeply established locally, but it is slow work.  So I console myself with dreams of new gear, the fact that I love what I do, and a knowledge that at least my life makes some sort of sense......which is more than I can say for the ending of 'Lost.'  My wife and I just finished watching it.  I have no idea what that was about.  I've been truly lost for the past two seasons.  I'm sure someone will give me the version for dummies tomorrow.

Irving Penn Portraits

Every once in a while when I get a chance I pop into a used book store and browse through their photography books.  Not the 'how to' photography books, but the ones with actual images in them.  I have a great collection of books building and I've really enjoyed the treasure hunt of finding this used, dusty treasure.

Occasionally I'll also add a newer book to my regular Amazon book orders (I'm an avid reader) that I know I won't find in a used book store.  Today, I received the 'Irving Penn Portraits' book along with my latest baseball novel.  I immediately tore the plastic cover off it and flipped through it digesting it immediately.  I then enthusiastically showed my wife and she said "so what is so great about those photographs?"  That did it for me, it reaffirmed for me that not everyone has to love this art, these images we create.  If my wife can be yawning about Irving Penn then maybe it's ok if the occasional grandma doesn't like some of my bridal portraits.  I went into my pitch to my wife how Penn's images gave me an instant impression of the person he photographed.  How his images were so well lit, and yet so damn rustic.  How I just couldn't help but stare at them.  I think she got it, or she wanted me to stop talking about it one of the two.

So I have a shelf for these books, and every once in a while I'll sit on the floor and flip through old photos in old (and some shiny new) books.  I tend to collect black and white work, but not always.  I have photojournalism, portraiture, and fine art books.  I find inspiration in them, I'm influenced by them, but I'm also just a happy consumer of the art.  There is nothing like holding a paper print of a great image.  Even if it is in a book.  I wish more of us looked at images off the computer screen.

You can find a link to the Irving Penn book in the Amazon link on the top right of the page, but I encourage you to drop into a local used book store sometime and seek out some art books of your own an a subject that suits your fancy whether it be trains, landscapes, birds or people.  Just don't go to my regular haunts, I don't want you depreciating my potential stock!

Olympus 11-22mm f2.8 to 3.5 lens

I'm a self confessed gear geek, but I'm not going to review a lens with test charts etc.  You can get that elsewhere.  I wanted to spend some time offering my quick impressions of some of my equipment from a simple users point of view.  I had one thing that annoyed me about my 11-22 Olympus wide angle zoom lens so I picked it to start with.  I also had a desire to start learning how to use the video on my Canon 5D mk II so I did a quick video just for that purpose as a bit of an introduction.  It is only about a minute long.



The Olympus 11-22 lens is one of their High Grade lenses, which is sort of their middle of the line lenses.  It is weather sealed and well constructed, but has a maximum aperture range of 2.8 to 3.5 on the 22 mm side of the zoom.  The bonus of that non-fixed aperture range is that it is a nice and small lens.  There is an apparent bubble on the outside of the lens, but filters can still be easily attached on the 72mm threads at the end.  The lens extends externally, not internally which is normally not something I love, but is isn't a big deal on this one as it doesn't extend very far at all, maybe one centimetre.  The lens comes with a lens hood, front and rear caps and a soft bag.  The front lens cap that the lens ships with is impossible to get on and off while the lens hood is attached.  That is a big gaff in my opinion by Olympus and I went out and bought a replacement pinch cap to use instead.  Also the lens hood itself is really hard to get on and off for whatever reason.  Very annoying.

For me, and the way I shoot the non-fixed aperture isn't a big deal as I tend to shoot at smaller apertures when shooting wide angle lenses, usually f5.6 and up.  This lens will close down to f22 which is nice when shooting in bright sunlight or when trying to achieve long exposures.

I have used the lens in the rain with no problem.  It has nice metal and rubber construction and feels sturdy, though it is also light.  The focus and zoom rings turn nice and smoothly.

This lens does offer very noticeably pin cushioning.  Here is a sample image, straight from the camera at 22mm showing that there is some pin cushioning even at the least wide side of the zoom.  I drew arrows in photoshop by the windows to make it more obvious.

Here is another at 22mm:

Here is one at 11mm with people in it.  I actually enjoy the distortion on the dog which makes it appear to be ready to pop out of the frame, but it wouldn't be as pleasant on a person.  I put an arrow on the dog to illustrate the distortion.  This is all easily fixed in Photoshop of course and this is straight from the camera.

Finally, four more straight from camera (some exposure adjustment on a couple) all at 11mm.

Now, if you stand back further with the lens the distortion becomes less apparent of course as you can see in the photos of the world's largest teepee (I'll let you guess where that is) which is I think 5 stories tall.  Also, like all wide angle lenses if you hold the plane of the sensor roughly even to the plane of what you are photographing it reduces the distortion.

I like the Olympus 11-22 lens.  It has been a good workhorse for me in my bag and gives me a good wide angle option for the four thirds system and its 2x crop factor which doesn't easily lend itself to wide angle photography.  Remember I use this lens mainly at weddings and for the days when I just want to go out and take some personal snapshots.  I'm not an architectural or landscape photographer by trade or I would certainly consider a different lens.  I don't feel a huge need to get one of the Super High grade zooms from Olympus that are more than double the cost of the one I own and I don't see that changing unless I get some money burning a hole in my pocket.  

Olympus E3 vs Canon 5D mk II ; Confessions of a Switcher

Note:  This is long.  Sorry.  Get a cup of coffee and settle in.  

What am I crazy?!?!  I can already see it now.  I'm going to get so much hate mail.  It is interesting in photography how we have so much brand loyalty to the point where people will call you interesting non-Christian names when you choose a brand that is different from their choice.  So in advance, to all the Olympus shooters that are going to call me a traitor and all the Canon shooters that are thinking Olympus is trash (and all Nikon shooters that think I've missed the boat entirely), just remember you don't have to agree with me and the sky isn't falling just because I'm sharing an opinion.

Good, now that we've cleared that up here is a little background.  My first dslr was a Panasonic L1.  I chose the L1 mostly because my first 'serious' camera was a Panasonic FZ50 superzoom, which I liked and when I became serious about photography I went with what was familiar.  Plus I was enchanted by the Leica looks of the Panasonic camera and the functionality of the shutter speed dial and aperture rings on lenses (I still prefer that setup over anything I have now).  When I outgrew the L1 I had a stable of very good lenses and financially it didn't make a lot of sense to jump brands.  Panasonic had put out the L10, but I wasn't impressed so I started eying up the Olympus E3 as it shared the four thirds mount and was truly a professional camera.  I had been considering throwing my hat in the crowded arena of professional photography, and with the E3 I thought I would get legitimacy and pro quality.  Little did I know that Canon and Nikon shooters would think I had bought a useless toy.

So in all fairness I didn't really choose the E3 so much as pick it as a logical upgrade.  I quickly entered into many different types of photography including shooting for the local newspaper, portraits, weddings, products, commercial events and kept up my hobby photography as well.  At some point in my professional development I decided to narrow my focus and stick with only weddings, portraits and events (as well as occasional newspaper work if it suited my fancy) and I started noticing the shortcomings of my equipment in dark indoor areas when shooting weddings and events.  At that point I started considering my options.  I figured that shooting ISO 3200 clean would be helpful and Olympus was quiet about whether they would replace the E3, seeming to concentrate on micro four thirds.  Panasonic had exited the dslr game completely.  I came to the reluctant conclusion that I needed a full frame sensor and would have to start acquiring lenses of a different brand.  I considered Nikon, Sony and Canon and I wanted a camera that filled the holes where the E3 was weak, namely high ISO and resolution.  Nikon was the king of high ISO as far as I could tell, but the 12 mp limit of its D3 (the D3X wasn't out yet) didn't give me the resolution advantage that I thought I might at times need.  I also considered that with a full frame sensor I wouldn't get much reach with my lenses any longer and would need to crop relentlessly which wouldn't be great starting out at 12mp.  The Sony A900 was tempting but I didn't think it gave much, if any, of an ISO improvement over the Olympus camera.  That left me with the Canon 5D mk II which I thought was an economical alternative the the 1Ds mkIII.  And that started my life as a bi-brand photographer and had me using both the Olympus E3 and Canon 5D mk II on a regular basis.  They share a bag, share jobs, and their files get processed by me side by side every week.

After I bought the Canon 5D mk II I mentioned it to a hobbiest photographer I know and happened to mention that I still liked my Olympus E3.  He immediately went on this rant about how it was about time I switched and passionately told me that once I got used to the 5D I'd see what a piece of trash the E3 was.  I hope he doesn't read this because I'm about to burst his bubble.

So, this article is about what I see as the real life, working photographer nuts and bolts advantages to both sytems, the Olympus and Canon cameras.  I'm certainly a gear geek, but this isn't about test charts and dynamic range tests that nobody understands.  For that you can go to a dozen techno-geek websites. If you are a Canon shooter and are curious at all about alternatives, or an Olympus shooter that has been eying up the mighty green grass on the other side of the fence then I intend this blog post to be about my real life working impressions as I myself make the switch.

Build Quality:

This is going to be a slam dunk win for Olympus.  It is much much more robust than the 5D mk II from Canon.  Canon might argue that the 5D was never meant to compete with a professional camera on build quality and the E3 should be compared to its 1D series and they'd be right except that the 5D series is heavily used by pro's and the 1D series is about 4 times the cost of an Olympus E3 when they were brand new on the market.  The 5D mk II is about double the cost of the Olympus.  The E3 feels more robust, better built (all subjective) and from a user that has had one for a couple years I can vouch for its weather seals and ability to stand up to constant use and abuse.  The 5D benefits from some weather sealing as well, but I leave mine at home on rainy days.  In fact today I have an assignment to shoot a parade for the newspaper and given that it is raining, the choice of gear is easy.  I'll give credit to Canon that its eyepiece rubber cup is much better than that on the Olympus.  The E3 one tends to slide on and off too easy and I've lost one already.  Canon cheaps out though and doesn't include a hot shoe cover for its camera.  The moveable lcd screen on the Olympus seems like a natural weak point, but I haven't had any trouble with mine and I like that I can flip it backwards to protect the screen against the body when not in use.  The battery door and CF card door on the 5D feel flimsy and breakable.

I've put the E3 in snow, on ice, used it in rain, gotten it dirty and dusty and it never missed a beat.  The Canon impresses with good build quality, but not amazing build quality, and not near E3 build quality.

Handling:

The lcd screen on the Canon is much larger, much brighter, and much more detailed.  It wins hands down.  Both have small information lcd screens on the top of the camera.  The Olympus rear screen can move and rotate though so for live view product shooters on a tripod that might be a huge advantage, but not for me.

Both cameras have plenty of buttons and dials for getting at controls like ISO and white balance quickly without menu diving.  Canon's menu system is easier to use and understand.  Olympus improved their menu's by allowing the user to change some settings from the lcd info screen.  I prefer the dual dial setup on the Olympus over the single dial in front and big flat wheel on the back of the Canon, but I suspect many will disagree with me.  The Olympus also has an easy to get at auto exposure lock button.  The Canon uses a joystick like thing on the back to move between menus and the Olympus uses arrow buttons.  Both work well.  Overall I'm more comfortable with knowing my Olympus buttons but I can honestly say that is because I've used the camera for a very long time for many thousands of photos.  The Canon is laid out better and will have a shorter learning curve.

Memory Cards:  The Canon has one CF card slot which is accessed by a rather flimsy door.  The Olympus uses a single CF card slot as well as a secondary XD card slot.  XD cards are terrible.  They are slow and don't hold much information, but Olympus gets huge points for having dual card slots here. Canon must leave this out on purpose to encourage upgrades to its 1D series camera, but that is pretty lame.

Grip and feel:  Both cameras have nice grip and feel to them.  They feel great in the hand, are well balanced and have curves and rubber grips in all the right places. Both cameras are similar in size and weight.  This is honestly a tie.

Viewfinder:  Both are nice and bright.  Both make it easy to see information on the bottom of the viewfinder.  The Olympus gets a slight edge as it has the 100% field of view.

Flash:  The flash system on the E3 is better.  Much better.  It has built in wireless TTL flash that works very well and that seals the deal for me.  I understand that that has been incorporated in the 7D though.  I will say that the build quality of the Canon flash is much better (I can't figure out why the Olympus flashes aren't weather sealed and the Canon one is).

Image stabilization:  Simply put, I prefer it in camera like Olympus, Pentax and Sony have it.  I've tried both, and buying it in each lens (and weirdly enough Canon doesn't have it in most of their lenses anyway) is expensive and presents no advantage to me.

General Use:

Sports photography isn't something I do a lot of anymore but each camera wins here for different things.  The Olympus 2x crop factor is pretty nice for outdoor sports (I still prefer the crop sensor for framing subjects, it is just what I am used to) where you need all the reach you can get.  There is no need typically for high ISO's when shooting outdoors so the Canon doesn't present a big advantage there.  Yes you can crop in the 21 mp files of the Canon and get the same resolution as the 10 mp Olympus files, but I find that makes it harder to frame while in use, framing for a crop.  The Olympus shoots 5 frames per second which is a big advantage over the roughly 3 frames per second of the Canon.  The Olympus focuses well with its SWD lenses, but otherwise the Canon is generally faster to focus when using continuous autofocus and a dead heat tie otherwise.  For indoor sports you just can't get around the high ISO advantage of the Canon.  It makes it much easier to achieve faster shutter speeds when you can crank your ISO up to 3200 or 6400 vs the 1250 I limit myself to on the E3 due to image quality issues.  So if you are strictly an outdoor sports shooter, then I'd say the Olympus has the advantage, but indoors the advantage swings firmly over to Canon.  As a final note I will say that the Canon gets a shallower depth of field due to its sensor size, and this can be both good and bad for sports.  Sometimes you want to really blur out the crowd behind an athlete which is great, other times you want more than one player in focus and the shallow depth of field hurts.  It is times like this when you have to close down your aperture and raise your ISO that the Olympus shines over the Canon and the DOF advantage is actually a disadvantage.  Also, the built in image stabilization of the Olympus comes into play here if you don't use a monopod for sports and you don't have an image stabilized lens.

Portrait photography is an area where I think I would have been happy to stay with Olympus.  At first glance you might consider that the Canon's shallow depth of field is a huge advantage, but the Olympus gets great shallow depth of field when needed and the only Canon advantage would be the ability to have such a narrow depth of field that you would have only an eyelash in focus and nothing else which doesn't often make for a saleable image.  The Olympus file size is fine for even large prints,  I rarely print billboard size images for portraits so I don't see a 21 mp advantage here either.  Also portraits are usually lit or in good natural light, so high ISO's aren't a big deal.

Weddings and events are where the Canon shines.  I've shot weddings with my Olympus using flash and outdoor ceremonies are captured beautifully with my E3.  But when that pastor comes up to you in a church and says "no flash allowed" or when you are faced with a dark reception hall or conference centre for an event and you don't want all flash photography the usable ISO 6400 on the 5D mk II is wonderful.  I still try and keep the 5D at ISO 3200 or lower as there is noise in the files, but that beats the heck out of the ISO 1250 limit I find acceptable on the E3.  Having said all that, I really enjoy working with both a crop sensor and a full frame sensor camera in tandem at a wedding for different looks.  I tend to shoot the 5D with natural light and the E3 with flash, so again, I get different looks.  Should I ever move entirely away from Olympus I'm sure I'll keep one crop sensor camera, possibly the 7D or 1D mk IV.

I'm not the most well versed photographer with landscapes, birds, fashion, food or product and commercial photography so I won't pretend like I have all the answers as to the strengths and weaknesses of both systems for those types of photography.  There are plenty of photographers out there that I'm sure can speak better on those subjects.  For you HDR buffs out there though, in my humble opinion the exposure bracketing on the E3 is much better than the Canon.  Canon doesn't seem to be that interested in HDR with the setup they have.

The Olympus doesn't do movies.  The Canon does.  This is going to be a deal breaker for some people but for me, honestly, I've turned on movie mode one time on the Canon just for giggles.  It is clunky and not easy to use, but the quality is amazing.  It's not my thing so there is no use me sharing my opinion about it.

The RAW files:

I've processed a lot of images from both cameras.   I'm not a jpg shooter, I love RAW.  I have heard that Olympus' jpg files are the best in the business, and that may be so, but frankly I don't care.  I refuse to give up the latitude I get from shooting RAW.  A few things I've noticed about each camera and working with their files:

The Olympus RAW files come out in Lightroom looking good by default for the most part, but not terribly sharp sometimes.  There is never an issue with vignetting with any of the lenses I use.  Noise becomes apparent at ISO 800, though very easily managed if so desired.  The files quickly come apart at ISO 1600 and unless the image has been well lit, in my opinion ISO 1250 is the limit for good files from this camera even with noise reduction.  There isn't a lot of latitude in the Olympus RAW files either.  If you miss your exposure don't expect to be able to yank the exposure slider more than one stop if you are lucky in Lightroom and still get a good result.  Being a 10 mp sensor, my iMac easily handles the images and I can move quickly when editing.  I have printed easily 24 by 36 inch prints from my E3 files with amazing, detailed sellable results.  I could print larger for sure.

The Canon RAW files are often kind of flat to my eye when I look at them at first.  I do occasionally notice some vignetting in images.  The file sizes are huge but my iMac handles them well except when it comes time to export them to Photoshop or for saving at which time things get noticeably slow.  I also have to downsize the images when using some programs like my photo book designer for instance as it can't handle the large file size.  The files up to ISO 1600 are really nice.  At 3200 ISO you get a file that has noise but is easy to clean up if so desired.  At ISO 6400 there is very apparent noise that can be cleaned up somewhat if you hit your exposure properly.  This is nice as there are very few situations where I feel I can't handle the light and still get an image without using flash.  I'm not in love with shooting at ISO 6400 though and want to avoid it if I can.  I do tend to shoot at a higher ISO with the Canon just to keep my shutter speed up as the lenses I own do not have image stabilization.  There is a great deal of latitude in the Canon files.  In Lightroom I can positively abuse the files and still get a usable image.  This is great as I'm not a purest when it comes to photo editing.  Pixels are changed freely and without regret in my post processing workflow.  I am glad however that I have a Drobo for storing those files as they would eat a hard drive in short order.  My workflow is to dump the RAW files on my iMac hard drive, and when I'm done editing I then move them over from within Lightroom to my Drobo. I have considered lowering the quality size that I shoot at with the 5D mk II just to save room and speed up my post processing, but haven't so far.  At this point I just don't need 21 megapixels.

So has adopting Canon saved me?

I think it is easy to feel inferior if you shoot with a brand that doesn't say Nikon or Canon in a world that is dominated by them.  I have never once however had a bride or customer ask me about my camera brand in a way that would suggest they wouldn't hire me if I chose to shoot with a Sigma dslr.  They just care about the end product.  It is photographers that care about the name stencilled on their neck strap.

There have been a couple of huge disadvantages to me in shooting with two brands of camera.  The biggest is that my gear bag is heavy as I have to carry two lens lineups to a job that can't be used interchangeably.  That is a big problem and one that will likely ultimately see me pick up a second Canon body (or second Olympus body if Olympus ever gets off their collective butts and releases an E5).  Also I'm very used to the E3 and can work it blindfolded.  Adding another camera and a different brand to boot into the mix slows me down as they operate differently.

The move to Canon was important for me in a couple of respects.  I need to be able to deliver a product to a client no matter the situation I'm in.  If I am not allowed to use flash in a church I don't want to use that as an excuse not to deliver.  And if a client wants to print a billboard sized print I'm happy that I shot with 21+ megapixels.  The other thing that made me happy I bought into Canon was the assurance I had that Canon would continue to make products to support me.  There is some genuine concern rolling around the internet that Olympus is going to dump their dslr production in favour of micro four thirds.  I just can't afford to continue to buy $2500 Olympus lenses when I'm not sure if they are going to be usable in the long run.

All of the above is true for me.  It might not be true for the next guy.  Right now I'm very happy I'm a bi-brand shooter.  I took a break from writing this (very long) blog entry to run out and shoot the Empire Days parade for the newspaper today.  A quick glance outside showed that it was raining cats and dogs so I brought the E3.  No rain bag necessary.  I ran into another photographer shooting for a competing paper with a Nikon in a plastic bag.  The rain was dripping off my lens hood.  No problem, the camera was more comfortable than I was as my pants soaked through.

I sincerely hope that Olympus continues production of serious dslr's.  There are some real advantages of the system and they aren't all about the weather sealing.  Sometimes I enjoy the less shallow depth of field at larger apertures.  I love that the lenses are all sharp right to the corners.  I love that the natural crop of the four thirds sensor is closer to the most common enlargement print sizes like 5x7, 8x10 and 11x14.  If they don't continue I imagine that I'll keep the E3 for my hobby photography and for rainy day assignments.

In the meantime, I am glad I started the switch.  I know nearly 100% for sure that Canon will continue to support my growth as a photographic professional with new equipment as needed.  I love being able to handle darkly lit situations and still get the image for my client.  The Canon lenses are very good too.  Not as good as your average Olympus lens, but very good none the less.  And for all the size advantages we are promised with Olympus cameras and lenses, they don't really deliver as I find working with my Canon often to be lighter and less bulky.  Go figure.

E3 image from parade today in the rain

I know I've rambled somewhat, and maybe lost focus and not answered the question about which camera is better, but that is really what is intriguing about this for me.   In everyday working photographic use there is no clear winner here.  These are tools, and no matter how much someone will get their knickers in a knot each system has it's uses where the other is frankly much weaker.  Despite my love of photographic gear (I'm a confessed gear geek-a-holic) I feel I can relax with my current equipment and know that there are very few photographic situations that I could not handle.  If you are a current Olympus shooter and want to know if I think you should switch to one of the big two brands I'll just say this:  it has worked for me, and I'm happy where I'm at, but photography is an expensive habit and I don't think anyone should spend a dime until the camera they have will absolutely not do what they need it to do.  Then, and only then is the time to switch, not simply when you are tired of being harassed by others because of the name brand around your neck.

thinkTank Urban Disguise 50

About a year ago I decided I needed a larger shoulder camera bag than the Tamrac one I'd been using.  I needed one that fit two pro dslr's in it as well as at least three lenses and a flash plus all the knick knacks that I would use on a shoot like cables, batteries, etc..  I had heard good things about the thinkTank series of bags and decided to buy one of their Urban Disguise models.  The Urban Disguise 50 looked perfect. It even had room for a laptop which I thought would be nice if I ever saved up for my Macbook Pro (still haven't).  After using the bag for a year I thought I'd share my impression of it.

First up, it is well built.  Each strap, zipper and attachment is heavy duty and has not left me with a single problem.  It is built like professional gear should be and I haven't a single complaint in that area.

The shoulder strap is nice and padded, but isn't particularly grippy.  It does slide off my shoulder and I have to adjust it.  The handles are strong, but not well padded and will dig into your hands if the bag is laden with gear.

There is a nice transparent business card pouch on the back of the bag which makes it easy to get cards to hand out quickly.  The back of the bag also has a large flat double zipper area that I haven't figured out a use for beyond gray cards or flat papers.  It also has a passthrough area on the back to slide the bag easily over the handle of a roller suitcase which is nice for travelling.  The front flap of the bag has a small pouch on a flip back lid.  Great for batteries, lens pen or wipes, pens, paper, and I keep Tylenol and breath mints in there.  Each side of the bag has a stretchy pocket that you can fit things in like Pocket Wizards, or a light metre.  They are not padded so you'd want to be careful if the bag swung and hit something, what was inside them would break.

The top of the bag zips open to reveal a configurable area where I easily fit one large lens, two small lenses and a flash.  I can usually squeak in some pocket wizards as well.  I sometimes leave one of my camera bodies attached to a lens in this area and not in the outside pouch if I know I will need my camera quickly.  The bag comes with padded dividers you can take in and out or move around as you see fit, all attached by velcro. In the zipper further back, where you are meant to store a laptop, I usually keep things like my flash adaptors (Lumiquest Quickbounce) and a small collapsible reflector.

Once you lift up the flap on the front you expose two pouches meant to store dslr bodies.  I can fit my E3 with the battery grip in one and my 5DmkII with no battery grip in the other with no trouble.  I do wish the bottom of the pouches were square instead of tapered as they feel crowded, but they do fit.  Behind those pouches is another zipper with several separate little cubby's and holders in there.  It would be a good place to store memory cards and such, but I stick very little in there as I find it is hard to get at when I'm busy.  I keep my memory cards in my pocket when I shoot.  The bag comes with (or at least mine did, it may have been a promotion at the time) a little memory card wallet that can be attached to the bag.  It holds 4 CF cards and three SD cards and velcro's closed like the wallet I had in junior high.  There is also a rain pouch that can be pulled over the bag, but I've yanked mine out and only bring it when I know there is threat of rain.

Lastly, the bag is meant to not look like a camera bag.  It is supposed to be subtle, and not scream "I have $10,000 worth of camera gear in here so please come rob me."  To me in this regard it fails.  It might pass as a big laptop bag, but I think most people with any sort of functioning IQ will know this is a camera bag.  And while it doesn't pass the sniff test there, I will say that in the past year I have looked no further for a shoulder bag. I love mine, and even went and bought one of their roller suitcases as it gave me faith in the brand.  I might review that case sometime in the future.  The thinkTank Urban Disguise 50 is available for $189.99 in Canada from Henrys.

And why on a Saturday long weekend am I reviewing a bag instead of shooting a wedding?  Well for whatever reason this year, May long weekend was cursed for us with weddings.  No successful bookings.  We are busy this year, but couldn't beg for a long weekend booking!  Go figure.  Then we had two engagement sessions today, first one the guy had the flu and cancelled and the second was a no show (don't know why yet).  Tomorrow we have been hired to photograph a parade for the newspaper and have a family portrait later in the day.  Hopefully those go better.

Captured by the Light; A Review

I just finished reading David Ziser's book "Captured by the Light."  I've done a lot of book reviews on the blog, and I consume a lot of books (I think I'm the reason Amazon is in the black) so I thought it would be wise to maybe start standardizing how I talk about these books by breaking it down into categories.   Here is what I thought of David's Book:

Book Content:  David breaks the book down into three different areas, the gear and lighting, compositional and photographic tips and a walkthrough of his typical wedding day workflow.  Each area is complete, detailed and helpful.  You never get the sense that David is holding back trade secrets at any point and even if you have never heard of David Ziser (what you been living under a rock?) you will feel comfort in knowing that you are learning from a photographer that has done this gig many many times.  Simple truth is he knows his stuff.   His language is plain and easy to read, he presents himself as honest and approachable and his book is fairly well laid out.  Each little lesson is broken down into just a few pages and it makes for a good book to pick up and put down repeatedly.  I'm the kind of person that likes to be walked through lessons with real life examples and accompanying images and this is how the book is laid out. If you are more of a table of contents guy that just wants to have a reference manual where you look up solutions to problems as they occur, then this probably isn't for you.  The only negative thing I can say about the content is that he does tend to repeat himself in the book.  I didn't mind it though as it really beats the lessons into your brain, but others may find it tedious.

Photos:  David has a traditional style that mixes in very contemporary use of lighting (he is a total strobist). My style isn't the same as his, but really that would be a bad thing wouldn't it?   We certainly all don't want to look the same.  The images in his book do an excellent job illustrating the lessons he is teaching.  Either he really practices what he preaches or he hired brides to model for his lessons, but either way you will find the photos helpful in the learning process.  The actual photos themselves range from fairly normal or un-wow-factor images that we all capture as parts of our wedding day coverage to jaw dropping and beautiful.  I very much found inspiration from some of his photos and looking back at this book now after having read it I can see how he influenced me at the last wedding I shot.

Value:  This book is listed at $65.99 in Canada on the cover.  I think I paid about $20 less than that from Amazon.  If you are a photographer new to weddings or contemplating getting into weddings this book is a must have and worth every penny.  If you have been doing this a while you will still get something out of this, lets face it David has probably been doing it longer.  It is up to you if it is worth the cover price.

The Good:  I love the layout.  I'm not sure if this is just a Kelby thing (it is a Keblymedia book) but I really gel well with how the book is presented.  The photographs are inspirational and his use of plain language is really welcome.

The Bad:  It does get a bit repetitive, but I didn't mind it.  The sample layout of a wedding album at the back of the book really didn't work for me.  Honestly, I didn't like it, the layouts were busy and crowded.  But this is a taste thing and I absolutely know that others will disagree.

Final Word:  David is old school.  He preaches getting it right in the camera, and he is right on.  I can't tell you how many times over the past couple of years that I have been banging my head on the desk while working on my iMac trying to rescue images in Photoshop that I, either through laziness or lack of attention, screwed up on the shoot.  I give between 300 and 800 images to wedding clients and the fewer that require intensive editing the better.  Some of his techniques I tried and didn't like.  I don't like the 'highlight tone priority' on the Canon camera and won't use it again.  He loves it.  I also don't like the idea of having an assistant always completing the lighting triangle from the room light (read the book, you'll understand) as he does get some bad shadows.  I loved his strobist style though, and I used a room light remotely fired a lot last year but had been getting away from it this year.  David has convinced me that my reception images have suffered because of it.

There are a lot of pros out there now making a good living selling tutorial products like books, workshops and videos to new up and coming photographers.  It is up to us as consumers to choose wisely what we spend our money on.  I get more value from books and well done workshops than videos and this book will be one that I pick up again.  I really enjoyed it and found it helpful to point my mind in the right direction with my work.  If you are interested in the book, you can find a link to it in the Amazon ad on the top right of the blog.

Funny Fake Olympus Ads

Credit for these really witty fake ads goes to this fellow from the dpreview forums.

I thought they were super well done and quite witty.  Olympus needs to hire this guy.

How to Use Off Camera Flash with the Olympus E3

I received a question about how I set up my Olympus E3 and off camera flash so instead of replying to one person I thought I'd blog about it.

There are two ways I use Pocket Wizards with my E3.  The first is the setup I use when I'm ONLY using off camera flash, and the second is when I'm wanting to use my Pocket Wizards to fire off camera flashes while I'm also using a flash in my hotshoe.  Remember that the Olympus wireless flash system uses TTL and works pretty well and with Pocket Wizards you only get manual flash control.  I don't think we need to be jealous of the Pocket Wizard TTL Canon triggers as I understand they don't work that well.  I use Pocket Wizards because they are reliable at almost any distance to work.

Setup One:

Make sure your flash setting on your E3 is set to the lightning bolt symbol, not auto or red eye, etc.  You can see in the photo above that my flash compensation is set to -3, that doesn't matter and has more to do with my other setup so don't sweat that now.

The Olympus Flashes (and Panasonic cousins) don't come with a PC cord socket which is daft, but there is an easy work around.  Just order one of the above from Flash Zebra and stick it on the shoe of your flash.  Then get a PC to mini plug cord also from Flash Zebra that will go from your 'Flash' plug on top of your Pocket Wizard to your female hotshoe plug in the adaptor above.    You can also buy the adaptor with the cord already attached to it, but I didn't do that in case the plug type I needed changed.

I put my flash either on a light stand, the hot shoe stand that came with my flash,a monopod, or attach it to something with my Manfrotto SuperClamp.  To attach it to a a monopod or lightstand you need an umbrella adaptor which you can also get at Flash Zebra.  I use the lightstands for portraits where I use an umbrella or to point the lights at the ceiling at reception halls for weddings (in opposite corners of the room) for fill light (flashes set to 1/8 power).  The Monopod gets used for portraits with an umbrella or to shoot through my Lastolite Tri-Grip Reflector if I have an assistant.  The little hotshoe stand is used for background lighting or when I can put it on a table or the floor and the Superclamp gets used in favour of the lightstand if there is anywhere to clamp the light where feet won't trip on it.

I leave my Pocket Wizards on Channel One all the time unless I'm working with other photographers and then I chat with them to make sure we are on different channels (or the same channel if we are sharing lights).  I leave my Pocket Wizard set to 'Both' not 'Local' or Remote.'  Then I set up my light, I usually start at 1/4 or 1/8 power and do a test shot and get my exposure, then I'm ready to go.  Easy stuff.

Setup Two:

When I want to use an on camera flash for fill light I use a different setup.  It's a little more complicated but still pretty simple.

First up, make sure you have velcro on your flashes.  I put the soft fuzzy side on the flashes all around them and the prickly side on the Pocket Wizards.  Then I just throw my flash in the hotshoe and put the Pocket Wizard on top attached by velcro.  You can also put it on the side, just don't put it on the side where the battery door is.  I'm going to be adding a strip to the side of my flashes because when I leave my Pocket Wizard on top of my flash like in the photo below, it doesn't allow me to use my Lumiquest Quickbounce.  Then take that same cord you used in the above setup and instead of plugging it into the plug that says 'Flash' put it in the plug on top of the Pocket Wizard that says Camera/Flash.

Then I wrap my cord around my flash and plug it into the flash socket on the E3.

You now have a TTL flash on your hotshoe and an ability to still fire your Pocket Wizard remote flashes.  I go into my flash settings and dial the flash power down usually to about -2 on flash compensation.  Remember, this is usually just for fill flash so that you don't get dark eyes.  The hotshoe flash is not your main light, the flashes fired by your Pocket Wizards are.  If you let your hotshoe flash fire at full power then you lose the nice directionality of light that you worked so hard for in the first place with your radio triggered lights.

If your Pocket Wizards aren't working, these are some of the problems I've experienced in the past:

• Dead batteries in the Pocket Wizard.  Just look if the little light on the Pocket Wizard is blinking
• Pocket Wizard is off (you'd be surprised)
• Pocket Wizards aren't on same channel
• Pocket Wizard switch has been bumped and isn't on the 'both' setting.
• Batteries in the Flash are dead (check the ready light)
• Cable has worked loose
• The hotshoe adaptor that is on the flash has slid slightly off or wasn't put on all the way on the hotshoe of the flash, it needs to be all the way on.

These things can be annoying so it pays to take your time and check your setup over.  At a wedding yesterday our Pocket Wizard wasn't working and we realized later in the day it was flash batteries that we thought were charged but were not.  Carry extra cords and adaptors as they are easy to lose.  I take the little plastic screw cover and hotshoe cover off my E3 when I know I'm going to be using the camera in this way and stow them in my bag so I don't lose them.  I really wish Olympus had just put a little rubber stopper over that flash sync port that was attached to the camera.  

I'm happy to answer any questions, just leave it in the blog post as a comment.  Good luck.  The Olympus works very well for the strobist type of photography so enjoy it!