I’m sure everyone has heard of digital film simulations on Fujifilm camera, and digital’s claiming to have a filmic look, but I have found a different way!

I recently picked up an Olympus Pen Mini E-PM2 in very rough condition with no charger from a Car Boot sale for £3! The charger cost £7 on eBay so the battery was now charged.

As it turned out the LCD screen is smashed so didn’t work at all - meaning there is no way to see what you are shooting. To add to that the battery door was missing, as was the thumb grip on the back. I chucked on a TEMU black metal thumb grip to the hot shoe to improve handling. It is a tiny camera with an equally small 17mm lens, so not difficult to hold anyway but the thumb grip makes it more secure to carry.

When turned on, it appeared to actually work! The shutter fired at least. With no way to review images on the broken screen, it felt almost like shooting film, so thought it may be fun to take it out for a spin.

The weekend after buying it, I happened to have an hour in Sheffield. I was mainly shooting a roll of HP5 in another recently acquired camera, so took the Olympus along for the ride.

Composing by basically just pointing at the subject and hoping for the best was actually quite fun. Having never shot Micro 4/3’s before, I didn’t know what the 17mm focal length equated to.

Much to my surprise - it did actually capture images! And good images at that. I really like the colours and feel of what it has produced, considering this was 7am on an overcast morning.

I always seem to get drawn to the contrast between trees and architecture in cities - you almost feel sorry for the tree, being so out of place from where it could have grown up in the forest!

It has a 16MP sensor so is perfectly usable in the real world - it was an entry level mirrorless offering back in 2012, so will never be compared to what is available nowadays, but for me it is just a bit of fun.

Wow, the reds really pop under the fluorescent lights giving an almost Cinestill 800T look - I really need to explore more scenes like this (at night maybe)

To justify the title… As I was shooting film along side the Olympus, it felt the same with no reviewing images like you tend to do on digital. I felt more raw and allowed me to just shoot what I saw without worrying about how it turned out.

One thing I am going to do though is order a hot shoe mounted viewfinder, as I did miss a few shots.

This was a fun camera to use - so much so I nearly missed my train and had to run to the station with three minutes to spare! I wish I had more time to explore Sheffield, as it has been over thirty years since I was there last.

Analogue experience on digital…

Gloucester photowalk…