Landscape Photography and the Olympus Hi Res Mode 

Thank you Mark, as a recent Olympus convert (E-M1X) and long time Canon shooter, this is a very unbiased informative video.

Since this video, the high res mode has been further improved. Where the camera detects areas with movement, it will replace them with data from the first frame. Sometimes this can result in visible differences in resolution/detail, but it is a reasonable tradeoff to many compared to, in your example, seeing 8 car images.

Hi, good video on this topic, but I have a few comments: 1.) High res mode greatly improves EVERY optic it is used with, with the probable exception of pinhole lenscaps. I have had great results, even with the 9mm f8 bodycap lens, for example! Same for the hand held high resolution mode, it is quite brilliant in all applied cases. 2.) For the best technical results, esp. with the very best lenses, in windy conditions or any other conditions that may permit camera shift during the exposure sequence, special measures and care MUST be taken to control any movement or vibration. Reduced sharpness will tend to be most pronounded at the edges/corners. By the very best, I mean lenses like the 50mm f/2, SHG 14-35mm f2, PL 10-25mm f/1.7, 17mm f/1.2 and the like... I use (and suggest using) a tripod designed for much heavier loads than the type of tripod you pictured in your video. In addition, (or esp. if a heavy tripod is not possible) for windy conditions, I would heavily weight the tripod using the load hook on the underside of the center column/head plate. A good way to accomplush this is to bring an empty bag with hanging loops or similar, and use rocks found on location to weight it. You want to add weight without adding too much additional area for the wind to act against, which is why using a camera bag/backback is not always the best choice here. This is esp helpful if using a carbon fiber tripod, as the reduced weight is not at all an asset while in use during windy conditions! From my testing so far, the Hand-held High Resolution mode does a better job with it's handling of movement/creating pleasing blurred elements, while also greatly accentuating sharpness and detail, reducing noise and adding color depth and latitude in highlights and shadows. It can be used at ISO's up to 6400 and it may be a better choice than T-HR, if shooting on a potentially shaky tripod, if available. This would seem to be the future.. 3.) Movement can be good. I find I prefer some movement in my images. Light trails, blur and other signs of life can often add to an image, rather than detract. While it can be a challenging factor to integrate into one's composition, I feel it is often worth the trouble, adding 'that special something'. As you say, making the right choice in the settings can make the difference, and this may actually be an interesting area to experiment with, for many users trying out this capture mode for the first time. Regards, Jan

Excellent commentary on the pros & cons of the high-res mode, providing very useful insights that I had not yet seen in other Olympus videos.

Excellent video! Thanks so much for offering us your experience.

thank youMark. High Res, Focus Stacking/ bracketing, Live Composite, Live Bulb, Pro Capture are the features I love on my E-M1 II

That’s the best I’ve seen on this feature. Many thanks.

Hi Mark: This has been a very informative video. I haven't used my Hi Res function on my M1 Mark ii in the past as I haven't had the confidence to try it. You have given me that confidence, so I am going to try it out. Keep safe! Cheers, Keith (Canada)

Brilliant contribution, so insightful, thank you!

Very well explained and informative.

It took me a long time to find the quick way to engage this mode. Glad you showed how to do it via the back screen options. I have used this on a 5.2, and it let me get a knockout shot of very unusual light and fog in Sydney that needed a lot of processing. I will try it with my 1.2 in panorama mode, great idea.

I like how you present the information. What surprises me most is that a 12-100 lens resolves enough detail to make this mode useful.

Thanks, looking forward to more analytic approach videos !

Thanks for this video. Lots of usable information in here. I was intrigued that the 25Mp high jpeg res shot is a smaller file size than the standard 20Mp Large Superfine mode shot, because the high res mode has Fine compression level (4×) rather than superfine (2.7×). Photographing some printed materials, the high res image is clearly better looking than the 20 Mp image, while using less data space! Of course if you shoot normal mode in large fine LF 20Mp the 25Mp high res image file is about 25% bigger as expected. I'm hoping to look into this more. Of course the 50Mp high res is a bigger step up from the 25 high res than the 25 high res is from the 20 in standard mode. On an EM5 Mk iii.

Thank you for all efforts

Thank you mark, very informative, especially using a SLOWER shutter speed to rid the bridge of cars. Sometimes, I find that the jpg comes out sharper than the orf.

Excellent. Thorough.

Amazing !

Thank you for your preciuous video tutorial

I don't know of anyone who explained the effects of shutter speed as well. Great information!

Excellent. I have watched a few of the Olympus instructional videos and they are useless - they just tell you how good the Olympus cameras or lenses are, not how to actually use them. Same problem with Olympus Passion magazine - some good images but no guidance ( unlike Canon’s EOS MAgazine which I subscribed to when I was a Canon shooter). Please keep these sort of instructional videos coming - there are plenty of great features in the EM series cameras to cover

Tried the EM1X in handheld hires, photographing a jeweller's window in a shopping mall with the 300mm f4. Compared it with my Sony 200-600 f5.6/6.3 on an A7R3. Strictly not a fair comparison, since one was a fixed focal length. But the Olympus images were far sharper, and I was handholding the camera with 70 year old arms. I had to rest the Sony on a monopod. Also I used 6400 iso on the Olympus, 1600 iso on the Sony. The Sony images were noisier, presumably because the Olympus reduced noise averaged over 16 exposures. However some colour information was lost on the Olympus. To cut a long story short I bought an EM1mk3, and sold my Sony lens. Love the camera, but the lens was too heavy for my collagen challenged arms.

Good example. Thank you

09-11-2020 Thank you for this information.

If you use pixel shift and measure an exposure of one minute, in effect you get eight minutes of blur, I think that should suite a lot of photographers, and generally minimise the artifacts. Unless youhave swans swimming around leaving their trails.

I may have missed it in the video, but the high res modes do an amazing job of noise reduction making high ISO practical with m43. I find I actually prefer higher ISOs with high res, since a high res image at ISO 200 looks almost too "smooth". (Like an overly aggressive fine grain developer, is the only way I can describe it.)

thanks for putting out this information, that fast moving objects are blured in a Focus stacking, its obvious cause they shot different shots one after another and not simultaniously. good information though

Das Problem welches ich mit dieser OM Funktion habe , ist das sich Teile im Bild während der Belichtung verändern, verwackeln oder eben nicht exakt deckungsgleich an den Rändern sind, in der Vergrößerung sieht man es . Wenn kein Wind geht oder das Gebäude still steht mag es gehen. Viele sehr feine Strukturen leiden stark.

I have an issue with Hi-Res on the E-M1 mark ii. It doesn't work over WiFi. Despite setting up Hi-Res on the body, as soon as you connect to a smartphone it goes back to standard 20mp single shot.

Thanks for the review of the Olympus high-res mode. Interesting results. One observation, if I could make. While camera shake(windy conditions) may have presented challenges, I wonder if the overall subject distance muted the high-res benefits. The subjects you zoomed into were at great range, and atmospheric effects (haze, thermal shimmering etc.) tend to blur all subjects at large distances. This of course is problematic for any image capture, high resolution or not. Perhaps highly detailed subjects at closer range would show more significant benefits? Thanks.

Thanks for this, but I using HHHR for 3yrs time, LR will have issue for the HR raw, if you Iridient O-Transformer to open the ORF, it will give you full advantage to edit.

Get out there and practice with it - there’s nothing stopping you 👍 Surely you don’t need lens capable of resolving high detail because the high res mode does all the work,in practice it should make a mediocre lens into a top performing lens!

I wonder if the hand-held high res. mode of the newer Olympus cameras alleviates the camera shake problem at all?

👍Bravo!

On the EM1 mark III, can we do HR mode (with tripod) with a larger aperture (if i got a lens with F1.2, F2.8 aperture )?

Hi-Res seems a marginal blessing at best. If you take into account multi-exposure blurring, possible diffraction or need for ND filters, potential camera movement, etc, the apparent benefits could be matched by a sharper prime lens and/or larger resolution sensor. For interiors Hi-Res has potential, but under such controlled conditions there are alternatives. Tests I've seen on Olympus and other manufacturer's high resolution modes, show no positive advantage that isn't equalled by a deficit.

What is the best tripod to use in mixed photo and video use with the EM1 mark III?

Can you show how to assemble several photos taken in HR mode in a single panorama? Thank you very much

the difference between the olympus and the canon night shot is due to the smaller aperture f11 vs f5.

Hi Mark, I am wondering if we can pixel shift while we are using focus stacking mood, means; can I get a 80 mp final stacked photo from the camera and having the both options functioning in the same time? thank you

I love it for my product and similar work. But at those resolutions dust becomes my biggest enemy haha

You repeat that the lens should be able to resolve the many megapixels - but is it not the fact, that because you put together the image of many shots, the lens should 'only' be able to resolve the normal 20 Mpixels?

Hi MArk thank you so much for this interseting video. But I ve got one question. Hope you can answer it. I am using Luminar NEO for editing my photos. I´ve made HRS shots with my EM 1 MK 2 and tried to edit them in NEO. Always when I try to edit them Luminar "cropped" the Image and I did not seen the whole Image. It seems to be zoomed into the picture. Is editing only possible with the Olympus Workspace or is it a mistake from me? Thanks a lot in advance to help me. Best regards from Cologne, Guntram

Just a point, there are 4 options, 1 choice. Not 4 choices.

Lr does auto import to Adobe cloud on my system. Are you using Apple? 🤔

My experience using hi-res mode on my EM1/2 with 7-14 and 12-40 pros lenses has been disappointing for landscapes, where I find the output to be soft and smeared. For still life photography, it works well. For me the reality is that my photos are usually viewed on screens, where the resolution is so low it has no impact. And I have never printed bigger that 80 cm wide, so really don’t need a huge file. I think that if I regularly needed higher resolution, I would buy a full frame Canon with 45 MP. But I definitely prefer the size, weight, durablity and value for money delivered by my Olympus system.

Hi Mark, did I get this correct? You made 6 handheld Hi-Res images with the camera and took all the single RAW images and stitched them together in Lightroom? - interesting concept, all the panorama images I get today by any camera are very low res.

So... the high-res is not really that good?? :-/

Owning both the EM1MK2 and the G9 I have noticed the latter produces more detailed hires images. I don't own an EM1X, but have read that IS works with hires images in that camera. I also have an A7r3 which doesn't require pixel shift to output 80mpx files. But I prefer the versatility of m43 systems, especially the Olympus bodies, and the smaller lighter lenses. To me, lugging a tripod around just adds to weight carried and partially negates the weight advantages of m43. So, I find the EM1MK2 hires mode a dubious benefit. Better, as you suggest, to do a panorama. And here m43 has a more suitable native output being relatively taller in relation to width than "full frame" cameras which have a native 3:2 format. Of course you need to combine them in post since neither the EM1mk2 or G9 will do it in camera.

Handheld 50MP 😊 not the 80MP 😊

Doublescreen, or whatever it is? Dude... they are obviously doublesensors.

Stop fooling yourself, there is no free lunch, saying that as EMD EM1X owner myself. 20 MP MFT is 20 MP MFT, what you can do with this sensor, the same thing can be done on even better 60 megapixel full frame sensor, the gap will remain the same, you think we can stack the MFT image and the other format system can't do it ???