4/3rds is a digital camera standard built by Olympus & Kodak along with a couple of others, but Olympus is the main driver in that seat. It's basically a start-from-scratch-this-is-the-digital-era camera system, and everything is optimized from lenses to sensor, for optimum digital capture. Seen how those legacy lenses give you those nasty blurry corners or purple fringing on some other cameras? Or worse- on a full frame digital camera? That's pretty well controlled here.
I only mention this because for some reason there's quite a gang out there that still thinks 4/3rds is a system that has no future. Must be a macho penis-size thing.
I bought into the system simply because I saw back then a nice camera for a good price- the first digital 8 megapixel DSLR camera under $1,000 USD. Like the shape (unlike most of the press) and bought my first DSLR- the Olympus e-300. It wasn't until later that I realized the system actually has some interesting benefits.
One that I just discovered, is that if you want to shoot ultra wide angle scenes with a 35mm equivalent of 14mm, on Canon *you have to* buy a Canon fullframe 5D (now going as low as $2,300 or so as it is probably due for a replacement anytime now) or a Nikon D3 (we are talking about $5,000 here and the camera is not quite out yet).
So yes, for a while, there was no lens you could use on a Nikon digital to give you this kind of wide angle, and if you wanted it you had to pay $3,500+ on the Canon side (until now) for the camera body only.
So what you can do in 4/3rds? You can buy the smallest DSLR in the world (e-400 or e-410) and plug in the ultra wide angle lens. The lens itself is about $1,500 and the camera about $400 now. For less than the price of a body only proposition, you can get 14mm 35mm equivalent ultra wide angle.
But then many sill think that 4/3rds has no merit. *shrugs*
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PS: For the record I believe all the current cameras from any brand are pretty good.
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