UKH

I'm thinking of buying an Oly12-40 Pro for my E-M 5ii. I'm hoping it would be an upgrade from the present Oly 12-50 zoom, but the current lens can also work for macro shots. So - would the 12-40 Pro be a better all-rounder? Or does a fixed 2.8 aperture have a downside? All advice welcome.

Thanks.

I had the 12-40 F2.8 but traded it in for a 12-45 F4 for outdoor stuff.

It's smaller, lighter and has the extra tele reach so better for landscape and climbing shots etc.

If you do a lot of low light stuff or events etc. then the F2.8 will be more useful due to the wider aperture. 

This was my standard lens before I sold my Olympus. For a standard zoom, it's excellent and very well built. 

The downside for me was that, whilst very small compared to FF gear, it's just big enough to negate the size advantages of the MFT system. It's all use case dependent though. 

Forgot to answer the 2.8 aperture question: to be honest, independent of the system you use, 2.8 is not that much of an advantage IMO. A lot of f4 equivalents are significantly smaller and you just sacrifice 1 stop of light, which is fine for most outdoor / daylight uses.

For proper low-light shooting, I prefer to carry a fast f1.4 prime lens (manual focus for saving on the size as well). 

If you are an MFT shooter you are probably not that hung up on shallow depth of field.

I’ve got the 12-40 2.8, optically it’s a great lens and fairly compact 

on a more personal photographic level I would get the 8-25 f4 pro because it is more useful to me. An ideal combo would be the 8-25 f4 pro with the 40-150 pro

Thanks for all the advice.

Have you used the 12-45 for macro shots?

I don't really shoot macro but max image magnification is similar 0.5x (12-45) vs 0.6x (12-40) at 35mm.

I'd agree with others that if your primary use is climbing and scrambling then the new 8-25 F4 might suit better, but for general travel, landscape and outdoor walking etc. I'd get the 12-45 F4.

I use a 12-40pro on my e-m5mk1. I've not used the alternatives mentioned in the thread so can't comment on comparisons, but it is a great lens and lives on the camera now.  The 40 end is good enough for 'rough macros' as the minimal focus distance is pretty short. The 2.8 aperture is definitely useful if the light's not great as it reduces the need to go down to noisier iso levels - the biggest drawback of the camera IMO.

Just purchased the 12-45 as it looks like a good general purpose lens for climbing photos. It's my first pro lens having previously used only the consumer lenses.