Several photography websites have followed up yesterday’s announcement of the Olympus E-1 with detailed First Looks at pre-productions cameras. Olympus have requested that no sample images are to be posted until a production version of the camera is released, which according to a lot of sites will be sometime in August.

Here’s an initial reaction from Phil Askey of DPReview:

“So far I think the E-1 is an exciting, capable and well featured digital SLR. My primary concern at the moment is price, with an MSRP of $2199 for the body and $599 for the most useful lens (14 - 54 mm) you’re talking a street price of between $2200 and $2800 for a starter kit*, and that’s without a flash. There is no doubting the build quality and finish of the camera. The environment proofing (rubber seals etc.) are impressive as is the magnesium alloy body. Image quality is of course the one thing at this stage on which we can not comment but I am sure many people will be expecting the E-1 to be at least as good as the current crop of six megapixel digital SLR’s.”

Website: DCResource

Website: DP Review

Website: Imaging Resource

Website: Steve’s Digicams