So i got myself an Olympus PEN F Yeaahh....

So i won the bid and then i realised that the Global Shipping Program is charging me for import charges which i found out is quite pricey. I thought at first that was just an estimation should it arrived here but then i was charged during payment checkout....i'm like WTF.... should i retract my bid or just go on with it close one eye? As you probably know i carry on and paid the thing. It actually became much expensive than the winning bid was....in fact i should have bought new rather than buying this pre-owned item. Well, i guess lesson learnt.

So after 2 weeks of waiting, it finally came via DHL Express.
There's no original box, so its just DHL packaging.. and again i told myself i should have bought new.
Upon unboxing the package, i picked up the camera and suddenly the battery pops out of the camera...well nothing fishy about it, not until i want to put the battery back in i realised there's a dent at the bottom corner of the camera near the battery door.

its kinda hard to see but you can see the dent.

I gasps! Was it due to shipping? Or was it dropped? It was fucked. The dent was so strong., the battery door could not be close properly. Fuck this seller selling me a dropped camera without mentioning it in the description. Well i was raised to be a nice guy, i didnt really make a fuss of it. Also i dont want to return it because i will lose money due to shipping charges. I lived on the other side of the world from USA, so yeah...shipping charges will be shitting me. Anyway I was too excited to play with the camera too. Its just a ding. just a dent. fuck it. Lets just force jam this battery door and closed it. Let me tell you, its a lot of effort to close the battery door. i slide the door pin and it closes but there was a gap. Its not pretty.

I'm telling myself it's just a gap. No big deal.......NOT.

I quickly checked the sensor, see if there's any visible crack or hairline crack, so far so good. Took a few pictures and the picture looks ok. nothing weird there. But i must confess, the focusing speed using with my 20mm 1.7 Panny lens is a lot slower than my Pen E-PL7. I mean what gives? I was expecting a faster performance but it was the other way round. it was noticeable. Maybe i was focusing in a dim room but still...i can feel the sluggishness. Just like how i am when i woke up. 

The feel of the camera is very good. the knobs, the handling. The front dial isnt actually in the way as some reviewers said. i love the front dial. that MONO 2 people been talking about. its so good. it made me want to shoot in black and white all the time and the best thing about Olympus is their flexibility. I can shoot in black and white and also saves it with the color profile 2 or your own custom color profile, just by using the bracket mode. This only works with JPGs. Well you can save RAW+Jpegs as well. 

All Black and White pictures are Monochrome Mode 2 with the grain effect at LOW. The colour shots are a custom color profile that i found on the internet, simulating Fuji's classic chrome or kodachrome. Now i dont have to edit much in lightroom. Everything OOC!

I also love the feeling of the shutter. Its so quiet and spongy. 

I also like that the LCD screen can be flip backwards so that it doesnt show the screen. Its like a wannabe film camera! And i just realised that i chimped a lot!! it felt weird when not chimping. 

But i do prefer the E-PL7 tilt screen style. Just tilts up and down, i find it unnatural using this vari-angle flip screen. its just so weird for me. Its like i have to look a bit to the left while the camera pointing straight, if you get what i mean. 

It is a fun camera, i almost dont mind the battery door issues any more until.....

The camera decides to randomly shuts down while taking photos.

At first, i thought its because i was using a slow speed SD card. 

So i swapped cards and shit still happen.

Read in a forum it could be battery.

But its not.

Because after a lot of research, i found out that this could be a shutter mechanism faulty. its hardware. its not something that i can fix. There was a remedy but it did not work for me.

The symptom was, its so random sometime after 30 photos, sometime after 5 shots, it turns to black screen and shuts down. It did not record your last picture taking. Turning On and Off brings it back to life. The remedy was to shoot in high/low sequential mode. At first it will shuts down but after a few shots you will be able to take high speed burst. Return to normal shoot mode and there will be no more problems afterwards. thats the remedy i got from the forums. But it doesnt work on my camera.

I tried it, and i never got to shoot in high sequential mode. Based on forum, this is a shutter mechanism problem. My guess is the drop fucks the shutter.

After toying around with the camera, i realised that the normal shooting mode, did not work. it will shut down.

All these times i was using a 0 sec anti shock mode. This works ok but randomly it will shut down.

Low sequential mode with anti shock works too.

Since this is a shutter mechanism my guess the electronic shutter will work just fine.

And then the deal breaker was all those Live Bulb, Live Time and Live Composites did not work. it will shut down after shutter is pressed. Thats so fucked up. Im not sure who to blame, whether Olympus for making such a pussy camera or the seller but i guess the seller got lied too when they got the camera. Why? Because this seller i deal with seems like a pawn shop. they are just the middle man i guess but still...they did not mentioned the drop in the description so they kinda lie too. motherfuckers. 

I got a crippled Olympus PEN F.

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