Yes, and my apologies for the condescension. Made me also realize the confrontation of tech/spec and esthetics. Two truths. I might have picked the wrong forum.
I'm not certain who the "condescension" remark was aimed at and it may not have been you. I do plead guilty to starting a controversy and coming on strong. I apologise for that.
I don't think the issue lies in the "confrontation of tech/spec and aesthetics". For me it stems from marketing and how manufacturers target consumers. My first m43 camera was an E-P3 and i admit that one of the things which attracted me to it was that it didn't look like an SLR but more like a rangefinder. Olympus played up that aspect of the camera's appearance and I bought it in part because of an emotional response to that hook. I liked the camera and when I subsequently bought an E-M5 because of its performance I hated the styling. I now use an E-M1 and the E-M5 and I still don't like the styling but I've come to accept it. I really like the feel of the E-M1 in the hand in a way I never liked the E-P3.
And now I find myself seriously contemplating a Pen-F. I want a slightly smaller, slimmer body that I can stick a pancake or small lens on and throw in the shoulder bag I usually carry with me and the E-M5 and E-M1 are too big for that. I used to be able to comfortably do that with the E-P3 so the Pen-F is highly attractive to me and the built in viewfinder really makes it even more attractive because I found the need to use an add-on viewfinder with the E-P3 and annoyance. It increased the size of the camera and came off in my bag every now and then.
What annoys me about the Pen-F is the way they market the retro styling. Don't get me wrong, I like the look of the camera though I'm a little uncertain about that dial on the front of the body, and I think some good ergonomic design went into the controls. What annoys me is the way the marketing plays on the rangefinder resemblance. It falls short of calling it a rangefinder which it isn't, but it's the hints and suggestions that what we'll get is a more "traditional" or "film-like" shooting experience which annoy me because that isn't what we get, but I find the hints drawing me in because I do have some fond memories of my time with film photography and I really liked the best of my black and white film results.
Selling something by hinting that it delivers something it doesn't isn't new, and these aren't false claims about technical performance but rather claims about the experience of using the camera. They're claims I find it easy to fall for and they encourage us to describe our experience of using the camera in the same terms if we find the experience as emotionally satisfying as the advertising suggests. I really don't like that and I feel annoyed for myself for being attracted to the camera because of the effectiveness of that style of marketing. I can't do anything about the way Olympus markets the camera but I do find myself wanting to do something about how WE, and I am including myself in that group, respond to it and play along with it.
I'm undecided about getting the Pen-F. I've been hoping for a new version of the E-M1 because I want the weather sealing and the body and grip work really well for me with the PRO lenses which are great for some of the stuff I like shooting. They're not the lenses I would use with the Pen-F so I find myself putting off a decision in the expectation that the E-M1 will get an update. In the meantime I keep finding myself fighting the "experience" aspect of the marketing for the Pen-F while being quite attracted to it as a good choice for the kind of use I want to put it to.
You just happened to say something that I'm kicking myself for thinking because I keep continually having to remind myself that what it will deliver is simply not that while acknowledging at the same time that what it will deliver is actually more than a big enough chunk of what I want to justify the purchase. And if a new E-M1 gets announced it will get a similar element of emotional BS included in its advertising but it's also probably going to deliver a slightly bigger chunk of what I want in a camera at the moment. I really don't want to buy 2 new cameras this year and an E-M1 replacement makes a lot more sense for me but the Pen-F is a lot more appealing to me than a new E-M1 in ways that have nothing to do with it's suitability for the photographs I take.
