Self Portrait in Govetts Leap Rd

Norma and I headed down to perform our Saturday morning ritual ... Pick up the Sydney Morning Herald and peruse its various sections over our cappucinos at the Wattle Café, say hello to passing locals and saunter back to the car via the book shops.

Cabin & Co is a home décor cum gift shop which we admire. On passing I decided to do a self portrait in the glass door ... as you do. I'd left the crown at home because I thought it might be just a trifle ostentatious for (ahem) morning attire. Anyway here I am clicking away with the OMD + Sigma 30. You can see the wonderful old Ivanhoe Hotel just across the street, behind me.

The Sigma 30 is coming along nicely. It offers a significant lift in general sharpness compared with the Zuiko 12-50 w/s zoom, although the difference is not as pronounced as I might have expected. At 60mm (FF equiv) it's a very serviceable focal length and I'll be interested to see how well it goes with portraiture in the next week or so. I have always found the 50mm f1.8 on my DSLR a bit tricky, shooting under low light. Miss the best focus point by just a whisker and you've compromised the shot. With the micro 4/3rds format, f2.8 gives me just a fraction more dof. Given the OMD's five axis stabilisation and basically better behaviour at high ISOs I seem to be able to overcome the one stop exposure deficit without real drama.

The OMD/30 combo is certainly more compact than the OMD/12-50 kit and prettier too - if it comes to that. I am a fraction disappointed with the slight barrel distortion under some conditions but then it appears to be better in that regard than the zoom so I can't whinge too loudly. Some reviews have complained that the Sigma 30mm focuses slowly although they may have been using one of the Pen series for the testing. I have found no troubles with focus - even in the darkest conditions. So far so good.