Survival Guide for New E-10 Owners

So, you've got a new Olympus E-10 in your hands? Well, here are a few tips and suggestions to help you get started! Note: I have kept this article on one page rather than multiple pages so that you may print it from your browser for easy reference, though this means the page takes a bit longer to load.

Power! You need lots of it!

Get good 1600 mAh batteries and a good charger! I purchased a Digipower Quick Charger (Model DPS2000 about $28) and I like Maha brand batteries. but any good 1600 mAh batteries will do.(Pictures and more information here!). This charger is fast, it takes about 1.5 to 2.5 hours to charge 4 NiMH batteries.

Get a spare battery holder (Part No. B-HLD1 $24.95). This will allow you to quickly and easily swap your batteries in the field. Since the connectors are in the camera (not the holder) it does not appear that shorts are a concern. This makes it easy to store your fully charged batteries in your camera bag ready to go!

Get a Maha PowerBank ($55) or something similar (See above link for pictures). These external power packs provide a lot longer lasting shooting time than the 4 AA NiMH internal batteries can. This model appears to be roughly equivalent to the CR-V3 batteries, which is quite good indeed. After a couple of hundred photos, mine still shows a 3/4 charge remaining!

Keep a couple of spare sets of the CR-V3 batteries in your camera bag for emergencies. They last a long time (up to 500 shots) and they have a very long shelf life (10 years) so they're perfect for this. {It was good of Olympus to design the E-10 so that we have so many power options, don't you think?)

Get an A/C adapter to use when transferring pictures or shooting in studio. I purchased a DigiPower model for about half the cost of the Olympus equivalent.

Get a case & bag - take care of your equipment!

Get a tripod (if you don't have one) and use it!

A good inexpensive model is the SLIK u8000

Read the Fine Manual!

You'd be surprised how much good information is in the well written Olympus manual. You can save yourself a lot of time and grief by just sitting down and reading it from cover to cover.

Focus - some tips and suggestions

Be careful not to cover the IR (InfraRed) window with your fingers! It's easy to do.

Remember to turnoff macro mode when done.

Make sure you point the AF target window precisely on what you wish to be the center of focus.

Check your aperture and shutter speed!!!

Use a tripod or brace yourself at low shutter speeds to avoid blurring your image.

If your f-stop is less than f4, then realize your DOF will be very limited and your shot may appear out of focus except for the narrow field around the hyperfocal distance (the plane of focus)..

Consider setting A (Aperture Priority) or S (Shutter Speed Priority) modes when shooting in situations where you know a certain f-stop or shutter speed are required - why make the camera guess? YTP! You're the photographer!

Hold still! Camera movement results in blurred pictures.

Wait for the focus locked light and beep and CHECK YOUR FOCUS in the view finder.

"Focus Lock" does NOT guarantee sharp focus, it merely indicates that the camera's AF (AutoFocus) mechanism has attempted to focus and has completed its attempt. YTP! You're the photographer! Use MF (Manual Focus) if necessary.

Make sure the MACRO setting is on when shooting extreme close-ups.

Experiment with your camera when you have free time. Walk around and focus on different objects, textures, and surfaces and get to know your camera!

Watch out for glass, specular brightness (glare), etc. Use MF when needed!

If having difficulty, try focusing on a nearby object at the same distance.

Use the highest fstop and shutter speed possible.

Try to learn the basics of the relationships between fstop, shutter speed, DOF (Depth of Field), stop-action, and so forth and apply what you know to the situation at hand,

YTP! You're the Photographer!

Remember the saying, "It's a poor craftsman that blames his tools." Take a look at the many galleries around the web and the photos featured here - clearly the E-10 is capable of taking great pictures - are you?

The E-10 is a true Photographer's Camera. YOU are in control. You call the shots. The images you get from your E-10 are the children of a wonderful marriage, that of your creativity and the E-10's fertile functionality, and grandchildren of the craftsmen, engineers and designers at Olympus. Like any marriage, it takes work to succeed, but the rewards are many and wonderful.

Ask for help!

If you get stuck, go to the E10Pro Community Forum (or your favorite forum) and ask for help! Thank people who help you and return the favor by helping someone yourself.

Have a Positive Attitude

Ignore cranks, negative posters, and go by your own experiences!

Experiment. The E-10 can be a wonderful tool for learning photography or expanding your photographic knowledge.

Shoot test shots when you have some spare time. Wonder how the flash works? Try out some tough situations and find out. How far away from your subject can you get and still get good exposure? How close? How do you use the flash as a 'fill' light source? (The E-10's internal flash works well for this in my experience.)

How do the A and S modes work? MF, M mode? Practice using those modes now and the skills will be there to serve you when you need them!

Set A mode and f8. Walk around (at night or in dim light) with flash active and take shots of everything that catches your eye (10-20 shots will do and you can shoot in SQ mode, we're only interested in exposure). How did your shots turn out? How many were spot on? How many OK? How many terrible? What does using such a simple setup teach you?

Set S mode and your shutter speed at 1/125. In bright or sunny light, repeat the above exercise.

Set M mode and set f8 and 1/125. repeat the above exercise. What did you learn?

Could you improve the "terrible" shots? How? What would you change? Try it! Did it work?

Take lots of pictures.

Examine the results on your PC. What makes the good shots good, the bad ones bad? Can you control the outcome? How? Try it!

I hope at least some of the above ideas will help you along your road to mastering the Olympus E-10 and the wonderful art of Photography - Bron

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