Ready to upgrade my EPL3, but not sure what I want to do

Started 11 months ago | Discussions thread
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Junior MemberPosts: 37
11 months ago

I bought an EPL3 a little less than a year ago. I really like the camera and the whole mirror-less interchangeable lens concept. By no means can I be considered an artist. My entire purpose of for this camera is to take better pictures of my (now) one year old son. The problem I have with my current set up is that most of photos I take of my son are indoors in less than optimal light conditions. This means high ISO and low shutter speeds, and many noisy, blurry images.

So my question is what would best suit my needs? I currently have the 14-42 kit lens, the 40-150mm zoom lens, and the 19mm f2.8 Sigma. My friend has a Nex5 and his camera performs considerably better in lower light. We have actually sat side by side taking pictures of the kids playing and the difference in the image quality is what has lead me to conclude that I need to upgrade.

Option 1: better lenses for the EPL3. My concern with this is what? The Oly 45mm seems too long for the majority of my needs. I have used the Panny 20 1.8 and didn't find it all that superior to the Sigma, and the focus was way too slow to take pictures of a one year old. That leaves the Pana-Leica 25mm - but that's a significant chunk of change.

Option 2: I have heard that the O-MD EM-5 does really well at high ISO, and I could keep my current lenses, but even so, just the body runs about $1k (and the lenses that I have really aren't all that special).

Option 3: I though about just moving laterally to the Nex5 to take advantage of the larger APS-C sensor, but realized that I would probably outgrow that soon, so I looked at the Nex7. Based upon what I have read, it seems like the Nex 7 has the best low light performance of anything in this price range. That seems like the best alternative for me, but, again, it's not cheap and the selection of lenses is somewhat limited (and expensive).

Option 4: DSLR. Something like that Nikon 5200 (or a discounted 5100) with a mid-range Tamron or Sigma lens would also come in somewhere in the neighborhood of $1k. But it's big and bulky.

TL:DR - I'm lost and don't know where to go from here.

Olympus PEN E-PL3 Sony Alpha NEX-5 Sony Alpha NEX-7
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