Advantages:

• Excellent resolution by stopping down to medium apertures
• Very low levels of chromatic aberration
• Quiet and quick AF Focus
• Effective optical stabilization system
• Good contrast
• Compact size and weight
• High zoom performance (200 to 600mm on 135 format)
• Good price
• Lens Hood for the price

Potential drawbacks:

• Plastic body (except the lens mount)
• Focal length markings are not painted entirely accurate (about 2mm difference at some focal lengths)
• No distance scale for manual focusing
• Initial aperture begins at the value of F4

Amazon UK says that: “This item is due to be released on November 8, 2010.”

Click ont store name to visit the product page and check price and availabilty or to preorder the lens:
Amazon US, Adorama, BHphoto, Amazon Deutschland, Amazon UK, Amazon Japan

Digitalcamerareview posted a 6 page long E-5 FULL! review. You can read their conclusion at page 5 (Click here): “E-3 owners and Olympus fans will be glad to know that the E-5 is a highly capable and rugged imaging tool. Others may be put off by some of the limits of the comparitively smaller and lower-resolution sensor.“.

First lucky user got the E-5 and posted some image samples inside the dpreview forum here here and here.

Olympus E-5 preorder links:
Amazon US, BHphoto, Adorama, Amazon Deutschland, Amazon Japan

It’s hard to find good, fast and cheap prime lenses and it is even harder to find zoom lenses! The [shoplink 17068]Canon 25-100mm f/1.8[/shoplink] is one of the few cheap and fast zoom lenses. You can find some image samples at 406club.dyndns.org. They used the Panasonic G1 to take the pictures.
Advent (DVXuser forum user) tested that lens on Micro Four Thirds cameras and said that it is “extremely fast zooming and very sharp”
A cameraporn pictures can be found here at getdpi (Canon 25-100mm on the GH1).

The lens is available at [shoplink 17068]eBay (Click here to see current auctions and price)[/shoplink].

P.S.: A high-quality alternative is the Olympus 35-100mm f/2.0 Zuiko Lens for E Series DSLR Cameras but it is 10 times more expensive.

Philippe posted some image sample of the new GH2 on Flickr

David Long made that nice GH1 vs GH2 comparison graph based on the latest Diwa-award test. DR= Dynamic range SNR= Signal to noise ratio. Click on pictures to enlarge!

Ananonymous source told us that “the 100-300 lens will be available in mid-November, and the GH2 is scheduled to arrive in the US on Nov. 28 or 29.“

PanasonicGH2 preorders:
You can preorder the GH2 at Amazon US but unlike BHphoto they don’t have the body only option :(
In Europe Amazon UK and Amazon France do accept preorders!

3200 ISO Panasonic AF100 from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

Philip Bloom just posted a short impression about the 3 days spent with the new [shoplink 16841]Panasonic AG-AF100[/shoplink]: “I have shot a little footage at 3200 ISO and it looks pretty damn good! Great to have features on the camera that I miss SOOOOO much on my DSLRs. Great to have a 4 setting ND filter wheel. Great to have a really good quality waveform, XLR inputs, zebras, headphone jack (!), the list goes on and on…stuff I struggle with not having on my DSLRs. It seems to have less digital noise than my 5dmk2”

The video he posted above has been made using the M mount Voigtlander 50mm 1.1 ([shoplink 17015]click here to see the current lens auctions and price on eBay[/shoplink]) and a Fotodiox adapter.

Filippo Chiesa compared the Panasonic AG-AF100 with the Canon 5DmarkII and said: “The new Panny is terrific: no aliasing, no moiré, the rolling shutter is present but minimum, great resolution.
The release in my hands, is not the definitive one and there are some bugs in the menu (the variable frame rate doesn’t work, for example) but I’m in love with this baby.“. You can see the comparison video on vimeo (Click here).

Reminder: You can preorder the [shoplink 16841]Panasonic AG-AF100 at BHphoto (Click here)[/shoplink]. BHphoto ships to Europe too and they can calculate the taxes and shipment costs for you.

Quesabesde published a complete Olympus E-5 review. They posted many RAW images you can download and analyze for yourself. Conclusion: “The E-5 is a good camera, but if all the hype mounted on the future of the system were not enough, the launch price is one of its main problems. Those 1,700 euros seem simply misplaced.”
Also the japanese website DC.watch.impress tested the new E-5. They published a huge ammount of image samples.
Olympus Japan confirmed the E-5 worldwide launch date. It’s October the 29th.
Baikal (dpreview forum) posted few pics taken with the new Olympus 40-140 lens: “My first impressions are that the lens can focus easily 2 to 3 times faster than the kit lens.”

Olympus E-5 preorders at: Amazon US, BHphoto, Adorama and Amazon DE.
Olympus 40-140mm lens is in Stock at Amazon and Adorama.

Panasonic GH2:

Diwa-awards tested the new Panasonic GH2. You can see the Lab-results here: www.diwa-awards.net. Compared with the GH1 lab results the GH2 shows a less noice and higher dynamic range. Color fidelity is about the same with the GH1.

Panasonic GH2 preorders at: Amazon US, BHphoto, Amazon UK, Amazon France.

GH2 Pre Prod SW V.0.2 loded as .mts org at 1080 24P from katten bjornen on Vimeo.

Katten Bjoernen used the new Panasonic 100-300mm lens. He also alerts you that: “This is not proper way to make any conclusion. This is prematur in all what that words stands for.
When i get 1.0 SW there will a better version to make conclusion out from.” Meanwhile also Hybridcams.fr posted some image samples taken with the new Panasonic GH2.

Panasonic GH2 preorders at: Amazon US, BHphoto, Amazon UK, Amazon France.

Panasonic 100-300mm preorders at: Amazon US, Amazon Deutschland.

Below a new Olympus E-5 video taken in Iceland!

Some more E-5 news: Ibarionex Perello posted the second part of his Olympus E-5 review and Fotopolis posted a nine page long E-5 review. On dpreview forum a user posted a E-5 vs E-620 vs Canon EOS 1D Mark IV ISO 3.200 comparison. Another comparison has been posted on Fotoactualidad.

Olympus E-5 preorders at: Amazon US, BHphoto, Adorama.