Olympus E-P5 delivers some welcome design tweaks (pictures)

The E-P5 riffs off of another Olympus film camera, and includes some changes that should streamline shooting.

Lori Grunin

May 9, 2013 10:00 p.m. PT

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Significant redesign

Although it keeps the same flash as the E-P3, the E-P5 gains a more traditional front dial. In addition, Olympus prides itself on the dearth of screws on the body -- just a handful on the bottom plate -- but it means that the screw-on grip of the E-P3 has changed to a shallow fixed grip on the E-P5.

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Top controls

The top stays fundamentally the same as the E-P3, but the on/off button is now a switch.

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LCD

Rather than a fixed OLED display, the E-P5's uses a tilting capacitive touch screen, similar to but higher-resolution than that of the E-M5. Olympus tweaked the design with side grips for easier pullout.

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New EVF

The new optional EVF is bigger and higher resolution than the old model, and Olympus offers it in a bundle with the 17mm lens.

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In another more traditional move for the E-P5, Olympus replaced the vertical dial with a thumb grip and added a standard thumb dial on top. The new 2x2 Dial Control allows you to quickly program the dials to toggle between pairs of functions.