This is the future of OM Digital: new PEN, new High Res sensor, and why not a new L-mount FF camera?

As you know OM Managers did release a couple of interviews that give us a hint about the future roadmap. In my video on top I made a quick summary and added one “teaser” for you ;)

What we will get in 2025&2026:

  • New 50-150mm telephoto zoom lens (f/2.0?)
  • new fast primes
  • New PEN cameras
  • a surprise ….this is a teaser for a future rumor post ;)

What is very unlikely to happen:

  • OM Digital joining L-mount with a Full Frame OMD
  • New High Resolution OM-1III

What do you think should be OM Digitals roadmap?

OM System says that they still have not decided the new PEN concept…and TG is only fixed lens camera they will make

OM System’s Director of Product Planning, Hiroki Koyama and VP for Brand Strategy and Product Planning, Kazuhiro Togashi, at CP+ 2025 (Image by Dpreview)

OM System managers had a chat with Dpreview. And there are a couple of interesting notes:

1) The PEN lineup will continue, but they have not yet decided how:

We think the camera’s design must realize the concept of the product, so we don’t start to decide the camera design before deciding the camera’s concept: the product concept must come first.
Therefore, we haven’t yet decided if the product design for a new Pen will look like the Pen-F or similar to the E-P7 because we haven’t decided on the product concept.

2) There is no plan to make an enthusiast fixed lens compact camera:

We are continuing to study the development of a successor to the TG series, but currently we don’t have any plans to introduce other compact camera concepts.”

3) New fast primes coming:

We are also trying to develop small and light and bright lenses or something like that. We have space to make new lenses in the future. I can’t disclose [the details].

Summary:
So it sounds like we will have to wait quite some time before we get a new PEN model :(

OM interview at PetaPixel: ‘A New Pen is Still Coming’

And yet there is hope, people!

In a chat with the PetaPixel crew OM manager Kazuhiro Togashi said:

“The OM-3 is not a successor of the Pen series. So of course we are thinking the Pen series is an important lineup for our company. We are trying to study the success of the Pen series, but again, the OM-3 is not a successor of the Pen. The Pen series remains an important part of our portfolio, and we are actively exploring the possibility of a new Pen model, and are currently considering what Pen series model we can offer as OM System.“

When asked about the trend of manufacturers removing electronic viewfinders he said:

We are considering both sides for market demand,” Togashi says. “We want to make sure photographers actually enjoy operating the camera. We are really considering which kind of product may be better to expand to new users. Maybe they want to continue to use their smartphone but have some interest in standalone cameras. So we are now thinking about the new Pen concept [from this point of view]

PetaPixel added that they got the impression the new PEN camera is still in early stage of development. If that’s true it might take 2-3 years before this model hits the market. What do you hope to get? a new PEN-F successor, and entry level PEN or soemthing else?

Panasonic did register another camera overseas: Now a total of three cameras should be announced soon!

On 28 February, Panasonic registered another new camera in China. We have now registered a total of three cameras in Asia that have not yet been announced. The next camera will be announced in April, and it’s a ‘niche’ L-mount camera that is NOT the S1HII. I don’t know yet what the other two cameras might be. Yesterday Panasonic said they are working on new fixed lens cameras, maybe one of them is some kind of LX100II successor. What would you like to see?

Note: The table above shows four camera codes for ‘unknown’ cameras. One of the codes is certainly for the Lumix S1rII, leaving three cameras that have yet to be announced.

First image of the upcoming new Telephoto zoom lens!

Today OM digital issued an update lens roadmap that actually shows an image of the upcoming telephoto zoom lens. We learn a couple of things:

  • The focal length is something like 50-200mm
  • From the design of the lens this surely looks like a PRO lens
  • The lens is white just like the epic 150-400mm PRO …and I guess price will be EPIC too ;)

I suspect that this could be a new 50-200mm f/2.8 PRO. But we will have to wait quite a while before we can hold it in our hands. OM Digital said the lens will be on the market by the end of 2025.

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Thanks Grytom

Curiosity: OM Digital says the OM-3 is the true PEN-F replacement

Photographylog shared an interesting tidbit in their OM-3 review conclusions:

OM System told us that the OM-3 is effectively the replacement for the much-loved Olympus Pen-F which was launched in 2016 and still remains popular today, explaining that it was impossible for them to make the Pen-F design fully weather-proof, something that the OM-3 notably offers.

Preorders
OM-3 at BHphoto, Amazon, Adorama, OM store USA.
OM-3 in Europe at Amazon DE, FotoErhardt, Fotokoch, WexUK, Amazon UK. OM store Europe. Amazon IT, Amazon ES, Amazon FR, Amazon NL.
100-400mm lens at BHphoto, Adorama.
17mm lens at BHphoto, Adorama.
25mm lens at BHphoto, Adorama.

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