Olympus Studio 2.3 — impressed

Olympus Studio 2.3 is the offering from Olympus for working with RAW files. Sorting, organizing, processing, etc. Analogous to Nikon Capture NX2 (see review) or Canon Digital Photo Professional (see optimizing).

When I say I’m impressed with Olympus Studio 2.3 for Mac, I mean it. It is clearly the biggest piece of shit RAW processing program yet foisted on photographers, making Nikon Capture NX2 (with all its problems) look darn good. I’m talking dozens of big and small problems, some serious, many irritating, there is literally nothing positive I can say about it except that it does a credible job processing ORF files when it’s not busy crashing.

Olympus ought to be red-faced embarrassed to have shipped this nugget to unsuspecting customers. Wait— they didn’t ship it, you have to pay for the privilege— I’m using a 30-day trial, and hell will freeze over before I willingly buy it. Heck, it’s so bad that I wouldn't even agree to use it even if Olympus paid me.

Except that I’m working hard on my review of the Olympus E-P1 for DAP and I don’t know what else will process ORF files from the E-P1 (yet).

Stay way for at least a year, if not two, from Olympus Studio (and consider software support very carefully when buying any camera system).