What is Reasonable Price for Olympus E-PM1 & PT-EP06 housing?

Hey everyone,

I'm brand new to underwater photography, and I'm trying to find a relatively inexpensive and simple setup to get started. I found someone in my local area who is selling "Olympus E-PM1, waterproof PT-EP06 dive housing, Macro Lens, spare gasket for the housing, and all other original accessories (battery/charger, A/V Cables, Manuals, etc...) in Mint condition". Says that he just didn't like diving and barely used them.

He is asking for $400, and I am trying to get a sense for whether or not that is a good deal. I understand that the gear would have been much more new, but it is older now, and I'm too new to this to really have a sense for how quickly dive cameras depreciate. I don't want to spend the money if it is going to turn out to be a bad value for older stuff.

Any thoughts or input that anyone has would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!

-Kevin

Hi Kevin

Others can advise on that particular system, but most WP users will agree that most u/w camera equipment depreciates horribly quickly! This is especially the case for housings and cameras. Strobes and arms might hold their value a bit better.

But a housing and the camera, I'd suggest, is worth about 40% of its original value after 3-4 years - depending on how popular a model it was.

Sounds like a great deal to me. That macro lens (assuming the Olympus 60mm here) sells new for $350 so is probably worth $250 used. You're getting the rest for a song, if you look at it that way. The camera is 6 years old, so it's dated. But this is a very inexpensive way to learn and then you can upgrade to something newer if you take to it and keep that marvelous macro lens.

I have the just the camera (with 14-42mm lens) and housing I bought from Olympus, on a sell-off,about 4 years ago, for CA$600 so I'd say it's a good deal. The only things to consider is:

• The potential need for a lens other than macro
• At the some, you will want to add strobes so check to what will work well with an E-PM1. I'm fortunate enough to have 2 x UFL-2's that work fabulous with the E-PM1 but are as rare as hen's teeth.

You can see some pictures I've taken with the camera and 1 strobe at http://caymanmarinelife.naishfamily.net/

Thanks for the information and advice everyone! This has been really helpful to understand what I'm looking at

I believe this uses the same port system as all the PEN cameras and the newer OM-D EM5 MkII. Whether Olympus continues selling housings with this port system is always an open question. Recent cameras in this range seem to be omitting the housing. The point is that there is an upgrade path and you could add a Zen or AOI port for a 9-18mm lens to this system and re-use it if you upgrade the camera.

I have the E-PL5 and a similar housing and am considering the same upgrade path.

You can connect any strobes that trigger optically to these housing using the ubiquitous Sea and Sea connector on the fiber. No worries there.