Taking great photos with the Olympus PEN-F

Here in Verona, there is one of the most iconic monuments in the world, the Arena, a Roman amphitheatre built almost two thousand years ago, even before the Colosseum in Rome. In antiquity, it was a place where gladiators challenged themselves in its interior. Today, every summer, the Arena hosts important music festivals, featuring performances of famous lyric operas.

My name is Giampaolo Mascalzoni, and I am a professional photographer with over 35 years of experience, specialising in advertising, corporate, and editorial photography.

For several years, the Arena Foundation, recognising my expertise in capturing reports and portraits, commissioned me to follow the theatre’s activities from behind the scenes. I provide the press offices with photographs of artists, singers, dancers, makeup artists, set designers, hairdressers, choirs, and orchestras. Each opera staged is the result of the work of hundreds of people—a small town in constant motion!

A good photographer must find the right empathy with people and learn to move on the field as discreetly as possible, becoming almost invisible.

The choice of equipment becomes essential. I have the excellent Olympus PEN-F, which I have used with great satisfaction for many years, and I believe it remains a perfect tool in situations like these.

It’s a model released in 2016, and I still remember when it was presented here in Italy. Absolutely different from any other existing camera, it immediately revealed the designers’ desire to create something iconic, with timeless quality.

The refined aesthetics instantly captured my attention with its unique retro style. The PEN-F is not only beautiful. The electronic viewfinder, though small, is very sharp and highly responsive to changes in the scene’s light and colours, remaining extremely faithful.

One of my favourite features is the “creative dial” on the front of the body, beneath the shutter button. It allows you to switch instantly between colour, black-and-white, or pre-set creative filters without needing to navigate the camera menu.

The monitor is of a good size with decent resolution, and it supports “touch” functionality, which makes framing scenes from original angles much easier.

The photographs illustrating this article aim to demonstrate the quality of the files produced by the PEN-F. In the theatre, to avoid disturbing the artists or being visible to the audience in the hall, flash or artificial lights cannot be used. Thus, high ISO settings combined with very bright lenses, like the top PRO F1.2 line of lenses or the Premium F1.8, are essential.

To address sceptics who claim that the system has issues with its small Micro Four Thirds sensor, I conducted some tests in a professional laboratory. Magnifications of photographs over one metre in size achieved exceptional results.

To obtain low digital noise with a pleasing “photo grain” effect when working with high ISO sensitivity in very low ambient light, it helps to adopt a small trick: overexpose the scene by at least 1/2 stop and recover the correct exposure later in Camera Raw. This approach will yield excellent results.

I also find it brilliant that Olympus has chosen to provide photographers with a lightweight system that is compact, robust, and of high quality, allowing you to always have the camera at hand, ready to capture spontaneous and impressive moments.

Even in my fashion photography work, I always carry my faithful PEN-F on set, taking snapshots of special backstage moments with the models, capturing the spontaneous atmosphere of a world far removed from the set’s lights.

For photos of this type, I love the simplicity of black-and-white photography. With the quick monochrome setting of the camera, I achieve excellent results with almost no post-production required. Connecting the PEN-F to your mobile phone via the app “Olympus Share” adds a fun element, allowing you to share the photos with the subjects and establish a deeper connection with them.

I find that we are increasingly losing the value of thoughtful photography, created with tools designed to produce perfect images that endure over time. The immediate speed of images taken with mobile phones undermines the fascination of the visual process we construct in our minds.

The black-and-white photos from my fashion shoots in Rome and Milan testify to how you can use a camera as a personal diary for daily visual notes.

It has been nearly ten years since the introduction of this fantastic camera, and brand enthusiasts are now wondering whether 2025 might bring us an updated PEN-F Mark II.

I would be thrilled to see this come to life. I imagine it could feature an even more retro aesthetic, a simplified menu, and essential functionalities that embrace the essence of traditional photography. Ideally, it could include a sensor akin to those found in cinematographic cameras, with excellent light and shadow gradation and a wide dynamic range.

Who knows if this dream will one day become a reality? For now, let’s continue to enjoy this little masterpiece, which promises to bring us satisfaction for many years to come.

Best regards,
Giampaolo Mascalzoni