Extremely affordable. Articulating touch-screen LCD. Support for add-on EVF. 8.1fps burst shooting. In-camera art filters. In-body image stabilization.
The Olympus PEN E-PL6 is a solid camera at an amazing price, earning Editors' Choice honors in the budget mirrorless category.
Make no mistake: Aside from a screen that can now face forward for selfies, the Olympus PEN E-PL6 ($299.99 with 14-42mm lens) is the same camera as the E-PL5 we reviewed in 2012. Originally released in other markets in mid-2013, the E-PL6 is an incremental update, and lacks some of the features—notably in-camera Wi-Fi—introduced in the 2014 model, the E-PL7. But Olympus has opted to keep the E-PL6 in production, and bring it to the U.S. market at a rock bottom price. It's a very capable mirrorless camera, and an excellent buy for casual photographers who want to capture photos that well exceed smartphone quality. You simply won't find a better interchangeable lens camera at this price, making it an easy pick for our Editors' Choice in the budget category.
Design and FeaturesOlympus helped to define the form factor of many mirrorless cameras with its PEN series. With that DNA in mind, it's no surprise that the black E-PL6 is a slim (2.5 by 4.4 by 1.5 inches HWD), light (11.5 ounces) body with a large LCD, support for an optional add-on viewfinder, and an image sensor that's almost as large as you'll find in consumer SLRs. It can accept any Micro Four Thirds lens, as well as vintage manual focus lenses via an adapter, and it ships with a compact 14-42mm zoom (28-84mm full-frame equivalent). There's no built-in flash, but Olympus includes a small external flash.
The PEN has a standard hot shoe with an accessory port, a mode dial, shutter release, and power button on its top plate. Running along the rear, at a slight angle at the top of the body, are playback and delete buttons, the Fn button, a magnification button, and the Record button for movies. There's a thumb rest underneath Record, and below that is a flat control dial with four directional presses (EV compensation, flash output, drive mode, and focus area) and a center OK button. Info and Menu buttons round out the rear controls.
For the most part all of the controls act like you'd expect them to. But there is one exception, and it's a bit of a doozy. The rear control dial doesn't directly adjust the aperture or shutter speed if you're shooting in A or S mode as you'd expect. Instead you need to press the up direction on the dial, which allows you to use the up and down directional controls to adjust aperture or shutter speed, and left and right to dial in EV compensation. It's a control scheme that is common in PEN cameras, and one that I've never quite gotten used to.
On-screen controls are a bit better. Pressing the Fn button launches a menu that allows you to change settings. The available functions are described in layman's terms—color saturation, temperature, and brightness are there, as are settings that let you change the amount of background blur (setting the aperture) and motion capture (setting the shutter speed). And, if you need a bit more guidance, there's a screen of shooting tips. Advanced photographers may scoff at adjusting settings in this manner, but it's a boon for novices. Also appealing to more casual shooters are in-camera art filters, which are accessible via the top dial.
If you know a bit more about photography you can adjust on-screen settings via the OK button. It brings up a side menu that allows you to control the stabilization mode, color output, white balance, drive mode, aspect ratio, still and video quality, flash settings and compensation, the metering pattern, autofocus mode, and ISO. You can also toggle face and eye detection and the internal microphone.
The 3-inch rear LCD isn't the sharpest we've seen, but at 614k dots it's adequate for image framing and review. More expensive models, like the svelte Panasonic GM5, typically have displays with 921k dots or more. The 16:9 LCD is wider than the 4:3 images that the PEN captures, so shooting information is able to be placed at the left and right of the Live View feed.
The LCD is sensitive to touch, which can be disabled if you prefer. When enabled it has two modes—one focuses and fires the shutter, and the other simply selects the focus point by touch. I prefer the latter, as it's a very intuitive way to choose the point of focus when framing a shot. The screen is also hinged, so you can view it from above or below. And, because selfies are all the rage, it faces forward so you can snap a shot of yourself.
But don't expect to upload your selfie to Facebook right after you've taken it. The E-PL6 doesn't have built-in Wi-Fi. That's a shame, but it can be forgiven at this price point. If the ability to transfer content to your phone (and from there, the Internet) is a necessity, consider adding an Eyefi Mobi memory card. It's not that expensive, and it automatically copies photos to your iOS or Android device via Wi-Fi.
There are only connectors on the camera body—a proprietary USB connector and micro HDMI. The SD/SDHC/SDXC memory card slots sits in the battery compartment, and Olympus includes a dedicated charger—there's no way to charge the battery in-camera.
Performance and Conclusions
The PEN ships with the M.Zuiko 14-42mm f3.5-5.6 II R lens. I've spent a lot of time with this lens—it's been the standard kit zoom for Olympus cameras for some time. It is collapsible, with a locking mechanism, and despite its plastic build the zoom action is very smooth. We reviewed the lens along with another 16-megapixel Olympus body, the OM-D E-M10, and Imatest results with the E-PL6 are consistent with what's published in our full review of the 14-42mm. You can refer to that if you want details, but the short version is that it's quite sharp, but limited by the narrow f/3.54-5.6 aperture.
I used Imatest to see how well the E-PL6 handles shooting at high ISO sensitivities, which are required when working in dim lighting. When shooting JPGs at default settings, the camera keeps noise under 1.5 percent through ISO 6400, which is what you expect from a Micro Four Thirds camera. I took a close look at images from our ISO test sequence on a calibrated NEC MultiSync PA271W display and was disappointed to see that, when shooting at default settings, the JPG output at ISO 6400 suffers from some excessive sharpening that gives it a rather harsh look. I'd recommend keeping the ISO at 3200 or below when shooting JPGs, or reducing the level of sharpening via the camera menu. The JPG output from the Panasonic GM5 looks a lot better at ISO 6400 to my eye; we've included crops from our ISO test scene in both reviews so you can compare for yourself.
If you're more serious about images you can shoot in Raw format. I converted photos from our test scene using Lightroom CC at default develop settings. There's certainly some noticeable noise at ISO 6400 when shooting Raw, but detail is strong. You can get away with shooting at ISO 12800 when working in Raw format, but I wouldn't recommend doing so if you're shooting JPGs. ISO 25600 is somewhat useable in Raw, although it's very noisy.
Video is recorded at up to 1080p30 quality in QuickTime format. Quality is just OK; details aren't as sharp as I've seen with more recent mirrorless cameras, and the sound of the in-camera stabilization system is audible on the soundtrack. On the plus side, the PEN is quick to adjust focus as the scene changes, and Olympus does sell an add-on microphone that works with the camera.
The closest thing we've seen to a true budget mirrorless camera to this point had been the Sony Alpha 3000, which offers fine image quality but a low-rent shooting experience. The E-PL6 has a much nicer rear LCD and is a speedier performer. If you've got more of a budget, however, don't count out Sony's fastest mirrorless camera, the Alpha 6000, or the Olympus OM-D E-M10 if you prefer to stay with the Micro Four Thirds mount—both are excellent choices that earned Editors' Choice honors when we reviewed them.
The Olympus PEN E-PL6 omits some of the features we've come to expect in modern cameras, notably Wi-Fi and 1080p60 video capture, but it's an interchangeable lens camera that's priced lower than many compacts with comparatively tiny image sensors. If you're looking for a camera that far exceeds your smartphone in terms of image quality, or even a backup body for a fancier Micro Four Thirds camera, the E-PL6 is an excellent value, and earns Editors' Choice honors.
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By Jim Fisher Senior Analyst, Digital Cameras Senior digital camera analyst for the PCMag consumer electronics reviews team, Jim Fisher is a graduate of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where he concentrated on documentary video production. Jim's interest in photography really took off...
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Source: Olympus PEN E-PL6
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