Olympus PEN E-PL1 12.3 MP Digital Camera - Black (Kit w/ 14-42mm Lens)

Looking for large image sensor and great image quality in a light camera body. Needed electronic viewfinder to help see image better and judge exposure and white balance. Wanted top-quality long zoom lens, but wanted interchangeable lenses to take advantage of lenses for Nikon SLRs. Wanted waist level finder.

For above reasons, chose Micro Four Thirds system. Wanted image stabilization in camera body, which calls for Olympus and not Panasonic. Also, had bad experiences with Panasonic digicams.

Very happy with choice of E-PL1 and later choice of 14-150 Zuiko zoom lens.

I recently sold my Olympus E-620 DSLR with the intentions of buying the Olympus pen camera. I have owned two DSLR cameras so far and really just got tired of lugging a big camera around all the time. I downsized to the Pen camera for the fact that I just wanted something more fun to take pictures with. I don't think the image quality is quite as good as my DSLR was, but very close. So with the smaller size and very decent picture quality, I am very happy with the camera. It does exactly what it says it can do. The movie mode takes decent quality videos and all in all the camera is fairly easy to use, contrary to what the reviews say.
The beauty of the camera is that it has removable lenses, 12 megapixels and a large image sensor ( the same image sensor that was in my Olympus DSLR). That combination is much better than any point and shoot camera can offer you. The size is also very small so its much nicer to take on trips and also much lighter than a DSLR. This is a fun camera and a nice second camera to have if you currently want to move up from a point and shoot or just want a smaller camera instead of always lugging around your DSLR.
I do like this new camera quite a bit but wouldn't recommend it for the $599.00 price tag in the stores. I did purchase one that was brand new in a sealed box on ebay and with shipping I paid around $430.00. For that price point it was a great deal in my mind. If you watch the auctions on Ebay there are some great deals out there now.
I don't really know what your needs are or why you might be considering buying a pen camera, but for my needs it was a good decision to purchase this camera. You just need to realize that there isn't a viewfinder so you will have to rely on looking at the LCD screen. Otherwise there is a external viewfinder thats available for purchase. This is something I might think about purchasing myself but for now I'm living without.
Not much else I can say about the camera other than encouraging you to look at one at a camera store before buying one online. I did only because I wanted to be sure its what I wanted before selling my DSLR and spending thee money I spent.

I like the size of this camera and the easy to use features. Some very nice features like multiple exposures allows the photog. to balance the sky with the foreground in various difficult lighting situations. DO NOT think that this camera will be able to focus in low light situations- it simply will not work for you.....There also exists no ir flash to will help it to focus in low light. Booooooo- Daylight hours is the only operating time that this camera will work- No low light situations-

If you are a sport photographer, please move on, this is not the camera for you. For everyone else myself included, this is exactly what I need, with bulky DSLR's image quality, and Point and Shoot's weight, maybe little more, perfect. In my case, I don't have to carry my 15+lb camera bag on my hiking trip anymore. What a relief.
The Good:
Best JPEG performance I've ever seen
Light weight
Excellent image quality in low light up to ISO 1600
Very good HD video recording
The Bad:
Slow focusing
Slow Shot to Shot
Lens selection is limited (this is about to change very soon)
Very weak flash power

This camera is awesome! It is small enough to fit into a (large'ish) man's pants pocket with the 14-42mm zoome lense on. It is light enough that you can actually do that and forget that it's even there.
And yet, it is effectively an SLR. It takes photos as good as a low-end SLR, has interchangeable lenses (can apparently use SLR 4/3 lenses with autofocus with an adapter).
It's shoooting response and most of its features are similar to an SLR. I don't find the on-screen menues & options difficult or very cumbersome to use at all.
My biggest complaint is that it battles to focus in very low light (you need to find something contrasty to focus on or use the manual focus ring). Oh, and I epoxied the lense-cap to the camera strap with some fishing-gut so as not to loose it!
Excellent value for money. Well done Olympus!