Olympus E-420 Digital Camera
from page 84 of the May 2008 issue of Popular Photography.
Olympus is known for building compact cameras, and the E-420 is said to be the world's smallest and lightest
Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) camera. It is 3 ounces lighter than the next smallest contender, the Nikon
D40X. It's MOS sensor has 10 megapixels (MP), live view where the display on the back shows what can be seen through the
viewfinder. The top-level Olympus professional camera is the E-3. It is not possible to view the scene in live view
on the rear display and the finder at the same time because in live view, the mirror is flipped up.
In accord with the small camera design, the camera uses the smaller, Four-Thirds receptor system which
results in a 2x lens factor, meaning that a 50mm lens will provide results of a 100mm lens on a film camera or
on a digital camera with a full-sized, 35mm sensor. In comparison, most Nikon cameras, such as the D100, D70,
D80, and D300, use a slightly larger sensor that provides a 1.5x lens factor.
The E-420 has Perfect Shot Preview which displays thumbnail images on the rear display which show effects of
exposure and white balance compensation. The camera also has face recognition for up to eight faces.
The LCD viewer on the back of the camera is 2.7 inches. The burst rate for taking multiple photographs is 3.5
frames per second. The older, E-410 could shoot 3 frames per second. The camera has dual memory card slots for
Compact Flash (CF) and xD cards. It has a self-cleaning sensor and wireless flash capability. There is not image
stabilization built into the body as there is in the Olympus E-510 or the professional E-3.