[Leica] GF-1 v. EP-2

[afirkin at afirkin.com (afirkin at afirkin.com)]

> I can not speak for the EP 2 but I have tried the E3 with a panaleica
> 14-150 lens, which is excellent BTW, which has stabilisation. The manuals
> strongly advise against leaving both stabilisations on together, it does
> not work. I preferred body stabilisation off, lens on in this combination.
> The EP1 I tried had pitifully slow AF compared to the Panasonic G1, so I
> bet the GF1 will be better than the EP2.
> I actually think IS is over-rated. It does not compensate for rotary shake
> very well, if at all, so in general I think it is a snapshot or get you
> out the sh*t solution. The E3 was very poor with long lenses and IS on,
> -very- few keepers. The E3 and normal lenses are not really much smaller
> than 35mm stuff, the teles are much smaller so I thought it would be a
> great camera for nature pix when walking my dogs but I got very few sharp
> shots, either AF or IS not working well :-( Better with MF and no IS.
> Not worth carrying at all.
> cheers,
> Frank

Frank I cannot really agree here. The E3 has fantastic IS. I did a series
of tests with it and even with wide angles the images were better at
1/500th sec. It is not a cure for everything, and you must turn it off
when on a tripod, but for hand held stuff Helen keeps it on all the time
and her images are VERY competitive.

Cheers

Alastair