M4/3 questions

[Jano]

Just back from my hols and ran into a few issues and have been looking around for some solutions but I'm just getting confused. A while back my Girlfriend and I bought an Olympus E-PL1 and a Panasonic Lumix G2 from Jessops, the G2 with the standard 14-42 lens, and the E-PL1 with the lens kit, so the 14-42 and also 40-150 (i think, off the top of my head). We've never really been able to use them properly till this holiday and we realised quite quickly that the kit we have is leaving us pretty short -

Firstly, the bags we were sold when we bought the cameras are pretty pants. The G2 with the longer lens doesnt fit in them securely at all. They were Lowepro Apex 100/110's I think. Any recommendations on better options for the G2?

Secondly, the lenses themselves, because of the bags, carrying around two lenses and swapping hasn't really been an option. The guy at Jessops also scared the life out of the GF and she refuses to change lens out in the open for fear of damaging the camera/lens. I have therefore been looking into a sort of all in one lens, and it seems there are some around the 20-80 mark, but they aren't cheap from what I can tell, and also seem to have questionable quality?

This also leads me on to my third question, in an attempt to look at a cheaper option for further lenses, I read up on lens adapters. The official Panasonic/Olympus ones seem to be around the £150 mark, yet I've seen several amazon/ebay links showing adapters for £10-20? Surely there is a catch here and I'm missing something?

We are both very happy with the cameras, just want to get a bit more out of them without spending thousands!

 

[Jano]

Tbh, if you are not willing to swap lenses over regularly hewn you might be better served bus bridge camera. The purpose of an inter changeable lens camera is to change the lenses...
What makes you so afraid?? I might to change lenses in a Saharan dust storm ( but might if the photo op was there...) but apart from that I will change lenses anywhere. Takes 2-3 minutes to clean.

The GF is unfortunately, a woman, and therefore effected by several malaises of the head. I'm not fussed about changing lenses at all, but she goes into major OCD mode at the thought of it. The guy in Jessops went all overboard about getting dirt, sand, direct sunlight into the camera lens and she's just taken it a bit too far. It's not really an issue, it's just easier for all involved for her to have a more versatile main lens.

As I said, I would happily carry around as many lenses as needed with the Olympus, I just don't really know what I should be looking for and if the cheaper lens adapters do the same thing as the official ones.

 

[Jano]

She's happy with the lenses on their own, but wants more versatility. The zoom on the 40-150 means it's too strong when taking close up pics, and on the 14-42 it isn't enough. Because these will be used outdoors and mainly with animals (zoo's/parks), it's very difficult to know what lense she will need until it's too late - changing lenses although pretty quick, sometimes is too slow. I know zoom isn't the right way of saying this but it's the best way I can describe it.

I on the other hand wanted to look into the lens adapter options as a cheaper way of trying out different lenses and effects. I just dont really understand why the official version of the adapters are so much more than the ebay/amazon options? Is there really no difference?

 

[Jano]

Maybe the 14-140 one was what I was looking at in the states, was around $400 there which was what made it interesting, I couldn't get it as the store had to order one in and it wouldn't have arrived in time.

I haven't really looked at the adapters, but if the cheaper ones are just to make m4/3 compatible with one other make of lens, it seems to be a better option to have a couple of lens adapters for the big manufacturers rather than the official one, if I am assuming correctly in that the official ones make the body compatible with all the old lenses?

 

[Jano]

Ahah, so the official ones are a bit more sophisticated. There also seems to be 4, MMF-1/2/3 and MF-1, all the MMF ones seem to do the same thing, unless I am mistaken here also?