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Olympus Reveals 9 New Point And Shoot Cameras

By Matt J. Weiss, January 7, 2010 @ 04:24 PM (EST)

Olympus has released 9 new compact cameras, including four for their FE line, four for their µ-line, and another Tough series camera waterproof to 3 meters.

Olympus FE Series-

Olympus is touting the new FE series as possibly "the world's smartest entry-level cameras," with their AF tracking which keeps moving subjects in focus, i-Auto mode that automatically identifies five commonly-encountered types of scenes and adjusts settings accordingly and also their Advanced Face Detection Technology. The new cameras are the FE-5030, FE-4040, FE-4030 and FE-47.

Olympus FE-47

For the most part the models are pretty similar, featuring either a 4x or 5x zoom, a 14mp sensor, 2.7" LCD screen, image stabilization across the board, with dual Image Stabilisation combining mechanical and digital image stabilization in the FE-4040, and a whole ton of color choices.

The two features I find most exciting are the USB charing capabilities found in all but the FE-47 and, finally, the ability to use SD cards.

I expect Olympus will be making housings for at least some of the FE models, as it is a popular series for underwater use. The Olympus FE series combined with Olympus housings has been a cost effective way to shoot underwater, and these four cameras a nice additional to the line up.

Olympus µ-series

Olympus also announced four new compacts for their µ line, the µ-5010, µ-7030, µ-7040, and µ-9010. The cameras also have a 14mp sensor and will take SD cards, but feature a longer zoom. The µ-7040 does offer HD video shooting, as well. Since the zoom function is the main selling point for these cameras, they will have less of role for underwater photographers. It is therefore less likely we will see housings for these models.

Olympus Stylus µ-7040

Stylus Tough-3000

Lastly, Olympus unveiled the Stylus Tough-3000 which is shockproof to 1.5m, waterproof to 3m and freezeproof to -10°C. The camera is really pretty similar to the other Tough models from Olympus. This model has a 28-102mm wide angle zoom lens, and features a 12 mp CCD sensor.

Olympus Stylus Tough-3000

The Stylus Tough-3000 is only waterproof to 9 meters, on the shallow side for waterproofs, but it gains HD movie recording and HDMI interface, 1 GB of internal memory and a SD card slot and also USB charging. All really nice features- especially the HD video. I think we all only wished it went a little deeper...

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