Olympus OM-1

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OM-1 MD.

The Olympus OM-1 is a manually operated 35mm single-lens reflex camera, part of the Olympus OM system.

[edit] History

The very first model was presented at the Photokina of Köln in 1972 and was called the Olympus M-1. Thirteen years earlier, the release of the Nikon F had made the 35 mm SLR the standard choice for professionals accustomed to Leica and other rangefinders, but it had driven the market towards heavy and bulky cameras. The Olympus M-1 changed this and with it began a reduction of size, weight and noise of the 35 mm SLRs. It was designed by a team led by Yoshihisa Maitani, who had already created the Pen and Pen F cameras, noted for their compactness.

Very soon a complaint from Leica forced Olympus to rename the M-1 to OM-1, and apart from the name the two models are identical. Today bodies and lenses with the M name are rare (5000 bodies were made according to Olympus) and sought after by collectors.

The OM-1 is an all-mechanical SLR. It has a very large viewfinder with interchangeable screens but a fixed prism. It also has a through-the-lens exposure meter controlling a needle visible in the viewfinder. It has a very compact body, essentially retained on later models.

Olympus OM-1n with 24mm Zuiko-Shift lens

Originally, the bottom plate needed to be modified to mount a motor drive on the OM-1. In 1974, Olympus launched the OM-1MD (MD standing for Motor Drive), on which a motor drive can be attached with no modification. This new version wears a small plate marked MD on the front, and a small round cover with a coin slot covers the motor drive coupling.

The OM-1n is the same as the OM-1MD with a redesigned film advance lever, a flash ready/sufficient flash LED in the viewfinder, and automatic X-sync regardless of the position of the speed ring and the FP/X switch, when it is used with a T-series flash unit mounted on Flash Shoe 4.