In an earlier post I described my experiences shooting Street Photography with the OM-D E-M5 Mark II and gave many examples of the projects I shot with it over about a two year period. I still have that camera and, of course, the lenses I invested in for those projects. Coming from the Sony A7, my first mirrorless camera, I can honestly say that working with the E-M5 Mk II was a genuine revelation.

So, in this review of my subsequent upgrade to the E-M1ii, I will avoid rehearsing the specifications and technical differences between the two camera and I'll concentrate on my practical experiences with the newer, flagship model.

Read the earlier post for details of my earlier changeover from the Sony A7 to the E-M5ii. As I said in that post, I found the E-M5ii to be an ideal camera for Street Photography, being small, light, fast in operation and silent - everything you could want to be able to make images inconspicuously working the streets of London. The autofocus was quite a surprise too - very fast to lock on to the subject and very accurate, probably because of the number of focus points and the benefit of both contrast and phase detect autofocus technology. Perfect for fast response Street work.

During those projects I also attended several workshops with photographers who were using the E-M1 Mark I and I saw first hand the advantages they were claiming for the E-M1 over the E-M5 . At that time though, the E-M1 was expected to be superseded by the Mark II version, so, although I was keen to try an E-M1, I was very happy to continue exploring the E-M5ii. In some ways, it was the better camera, having been released early in 2015 sporting Olympus's latest technology, whereas the E-M1 was first introduced as their flagship model in September 2013. It was to be almost three and a half years before the E-M1 Mark II was actually available from suppliers! But worth the wait!

So, it was in February 2017 I was finally able to get my hands on the upgraded E-M1 Mark II. All my 'photobuddies' were expecting a minor upgrade, but we were all surprised at the actual difference in performance, rather than just the specification changes.