IBIS or Mega OIS?

[bilzmale]

As an E-P2 owner with a Panny 45-200 in transit to me I would seem to have the choice of either the Oly in body stabilization OR the Panny in lens stabilization but NOT both at once.

I know there is a lot of cross-ownership on these forums and was wondering what the conventional wisdom is on which IS to choose. I know the lens has an on/off switch.

Did search the forum without result so apologies if this has been dealt with elsewhere.

 

[BillN]

Morning Bill

Good question

this is a question I have thought about and should have asked

"are two IS's better than one"

or does 1+1 = 0

Cheers

 

[Boyzo]

IBIS / OIS thread here...

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1041&message=34625167

 

[BillN]

Thanks that sorts it

 

[bilzmale]

Some conflicting opinions (as always) but my summary is OIS is preferred to IBIS if the lens has it. Common sense suggests to me that using both will not improve things and may degrade the sharpness. Thanks for the link and your own shots Boyzo.

 

[BBW]

I'm a bit confused by this. I have an E-P2 and primarily use the panny 20mm 1.7 and have never changed any controls on either and think I've been getting very good results.

Can someone clarify this a bit more?

 

[BillN]

I'm a bit confused by this. I have an E-P2 and primarily use the panny 20mm 1.7 and have never changed any controls on either and think I've been getting very good results.

Can someone clarify this a bit more?

I think that's fine as the Pany 20mm does not have OS in the lens

only the Pany longer lenses, at the present time

so you would have IBIS switched on on your EP-2

 

[Streetshooter]

I wasn't aware that the IS on Panny lenses worked on the Pen cameras.
This is news to me. I always assumed the IBIS on the Pen worked with anything and it does.
We need Mr Mosley to clarify this...pronto!
a not stabilized shooter

 

[igi]

I prefer IBIS hands-down

It connects your camera to the past technologies like the time when lens are made of metal, sans stabilization and you'd have to walk to zoom:smile:

Don't get me wrong, I'm still young (clue: late 80's) but I want "involvement" in photography

 

[BBW]

Oh, so Bill this is why we...or, um, I don't have to think about it? The 20mm doesn't have it? That's a relief because I'd hate to think my impressions were all wrong. However, this is something important to know more about should any of us go down the route with "longer" lenses...

Looking forward to learning more.

 

[Streetshooter]

Brian...Where you is Brian?

 

[BBW]

Brian are you here? Anyone else care to weigh in?

 

[squeegee]

I wasn't aware that the IS on Panny lenses worked on the Pen cameras.
This is news to me. I always assumed the IBIS on the Pen worked with anything and it does.
We need Mr Mosley to clarify this...pronto!
a not stabilized shooter

yes they do, and yes the IBIS works on anything as well.

The things you don't want to do is run both at once i.e. IBIS + OIS, they conflict with each other and give poor results.

You want to either run the IBIS and turn OIS off, or turn IBIS off and run OIS on.

With at least the original 4/3rds oly's, they were coded to automatically disable ibis if the ois was enabled. I'm assuming this is still true for m4/3's

The 20mm prime has no OIS, so don't worry, jus tuse the IBIS, you can usually see the OIS labels on the other panny's letting you know it's available.

 

[BBW]

The 20mm prime has no OIS, so don't worry, jus tuse the IBIS, you can usually see the OIS labels on the other panny's letting you know it's available.

Well, that's a relief to read, otherwise it would be a trip to the eye doctor for me, since I thought everything was fine.

Important for everyone to know about these other lenses if they use them on an E-P. Thanks squeegee!

 

[Brian Mosley]

The only Panasonic m4/3rds lenses which have OIS (Optical Image Stabilisation in the lens) are the 14-45, 14-140, 45 and 45-200mm lenses.

If you're using one of these lenses on a Pen and shooting video, move the OIS switch to the ON position on the lens... the lens will constantly move the lens elements to provide image stabilisation.
The Pen doesn't use IBIS (In Body Image Stabilisation) while shooting video, so you don't need to do anything else.

If you're shooting stills, I'd recommend moving the OIS switch to the OFF position and make sure IS is enabled on the Pen... this will conserve battery power.

Cheers

Brian

 

[Boyzo]

The only Panasonic m4/3rds lenses which have OIS (Optical Image Stabilisation in the lens) are the 14-45, 14-140, 45 and 45-200mm lenses.

If you're using one of these lenses on a Pen and shooting video, move the OIS switch to the ON position on the lens... the lens will constantly move the lens elements to provide image stabilisation.
The Pen doesn't use IBIS (In Body Image Stabilisation) while shooting video, so you don't need to do anything else.

If you're shooting stills, I'd recommend moving the OIS switch to the OFF position and make sure IS is enabled on the Pen... this will conserve battery power.

Cheers

Brian

Well said Brain.../

as for OIS versus IBIS ...

It also depends on your particular steadiness at the point of shooting, so I would be more than happy with either.

If both are on then results don't seem bad at all from my experience but then it will depend on how slow the shutter speed was .. the slower the more IBIS / OIS have to work and if both are on may well spell bad image quality.

 

[squeegee]

Well said Brain.../

as for OIS versus IBIS ...

It also depends on your particular steadiness at the point of shooting, so I would be more than happy with either.

If both are on then results don't seem bad at all from my experience but then it will depend on how slow the shutter speed was .. the slower the more IBIS / OIS have to work and if both are on may well spell bad image quality.

Generally speaking you can't have IBIS/OIS on at the same time, it'll automatically turn the IBIS off, you might want to check that both were actually active. If you do a web search (I can't remember where it was), some one managed to force the ibis + ois on at the same time by doing something funky, the results were significantly worst.

BTW, it's also recommended to turn of IS (body or lens) when using a tripod. Allegedly, it makes things worst if it's on a tripod, I'm not sure why tough.

As for other comparisons... I believe with OIS, there's a setting to have IS on all the time, this means you can see and focus easier as the image is stabilized. With the IBIS it only turns on after shutter release, this means it might be harder to frame / focus because the image maybe shaky.

As for movie modes... on the e-p1 and presumably it's relatives.. IS is available, but it does not use sensor-shift IS, it uses electronic image stabilisation, (generally this means capturing an area slightly larger than the frame size and shifting the viewing area captured to make it look still between movie frames. Now personally you'd think that OIS + EIS should work, but for some reason olympus also recommends you only use one or the other, not sure why.

Oh another thing... for IBIS (at least for the e-p1), it only works for up to 2 second shutter speeds. It will automatically disable IS if your shutter speed is more than 2 seconds. I suspect with OIS you can force it on anyways since it's switched on the lens. I've been trying to find if oly has a minimum shutter speed but I haven't found any documentation of it yet. I suspect at things like 1/1000 shutter speeds IS is disabled but I can't find any information on this...

 

[chrisman]

If you have a camera with IBIS (Olympus) and an OIS lens (Panasonic) then you should turn off the lens' OIS - that is assuming it would work on a non-Panasonic camera anyway.

My personal preference is for IBIS since any lens becomes 'stabilised' and non-stabilised lenses are inherently cheaper. I previously owned a Pentax K10D with IBIS, and top quality Pentax Limited glass was far cheaper than the equivalent Canon or Nikon stabilised lenses.

Generally it would seem that OIS lenses give an extra stop over lenses on IBIS systems, at least during testing - the reality may be less distinct.

Despite all this I still purchased a GF1! - it had, and still has, the right 'feel'

Chris