It doesn’t take much of a camera to capture a simple snapshot. But what if you spot a little girl in the park standing amid a flock of startled pigeons? Or you’re photographing the unpredictable twirls of dancers on a stage? Or you’re shooting travel scenes in bright, contrasty mid-day sun? For that you need a special camera.

And to prove that the new 10.1-megapixel Olympus E-3 is a special camera that can handle just about anything a setting can dish out, Olympus invited me and other members of the photographic press to Puerto Rico in early November for several days of hands-on evaluation.

A full test of the E-3 ($1,700, estimated street, body only) is now underway in the Pop Photo Lab, and we’ll give you the numbers as soon as the data is certified. But in the meantime, let me offer some thoughts on how the E-3 fares in the field.

**** FAST THINKING** **

That photo op with the little girl and the pigeons was exactly what I faced as I walked around Ponce, the quiet port city on Puerto Rico’s southern Caribbean coast. With the E-3 hanging on my shoulder, I literally had just enough time to swing it up and shoot before the girl, the birds, and the opportunity were gone.

This is where the camera’s new autofocus system really proved itself. A far cry from the slow and fairly crude AF system on 2003’s E-1, the E-3’s AF system is as fast as it is unique.
There are 11 AF points clustered around the center of the screen where Olympus engineers have determined that most subjects appear (surprise!). While the E-3 won’t win for sheer AF-point quantity (that distinction belongs to the Nikon D300, with 51 points), each of the E-3’s 11 points has a twin that is offset by half a pixel. The result: thorough coverage and super sensitivity. The little girl in my shot is tack sharp, with the focus right where I wanted it.

Olympus is so determined to ensure the precision of this system that a temperature sensor is built into the AF module so that as the surrounding material expands and contracts with heat and cold, the camera recalculates its AF readings.

The news on the AF front extends to the lenses, too, with new Super Sonic Wave Drive motors turning the latest Zuiko lenses, such as the 12-60mm f/2.8-4 that came with the E-3 I used. As one Olympus engineer described it, the motors grab and grip the turning mechanism much the way a horse’s hooves move along the ground. This gives the new lenses faster AF acceleration and braking than their predecessors.

Fast AF is accompanied by a robust 5-frames-per-second burst rate. Again, not the highest in the competitive set, but impressive. Especially when all of those 5 frames can be in RAW, with the buffer gulping down 17 frames before it starts to slow to about 1 frame per second, depending on the speed of the memory card.

****HOLD THAT THOUGHT****

The notion of speedy shooting is underscored by the E-3’s image stabilization system. A sensor-based approach that ups the sensitivity and alacrity of the I.S. system used on early 2007’s Olympus E-510 DSLR, it helps keep the tripod tucked away.

The I.S. has three settings — off, all-around stabilization, and vertical-only stabilization for panning. Shooting handheld, I kept the all-around I.S. on during my whole time in Puerto Rico, and never encountered blur. But then, I never went below 1/25 sec. The reason? I couldn’t resist dialing up the ISO. Although the results aren’t yet in from the Pop Photo Lab, it’s clear to me that the E-3 is among the new breed of low-noise DSLRs.

One evening in San Juan, as dancers performed in the courtyard of the sprawling 17th-century fort, Castillo de San Cristobal, I was able to shoot at 1/500 sec, thanks to triple-digit ISO. Low light? ISO 3200 is just a thumbwheel turn away.

GET NEW PERSPECTIVE

Another example of how the E-3 can help with new perspectives came in Ponce at the Castillon Serralles. This 1930s Spanish-revival-style mansion was the home to the distillers behind Don Q rum, and today is a museum with beautifully maintained gardens. I wanted a low shot of a fountain and pool on the grounds. With a conventional DSLR, it would have meant getting down on my stomach and looking through the viewfinder. Even with one of the new breed of live-view DSLRs, it wouldn’t have been easy.

But the E-3 has, in addition to live view, a swiveling and rotating LCD screen (much like the one on Panasonic’s new Lumix L10). Though it doesn’t swivel around continuously as the pull-out screens on many camcorders do, this 2.5-inch LCD goes 360 degrees and can be positioned any way you want, so that getting low-down shots doesn’t require gymnastics. I simply put the camera down at pool level, knelt next to it, and tilted the LCD for an optimum view. (Pressing the live view button on the back of the camera pulls up an on-screen reminder to throw the little lever that prevents light from entering the viewfinder eyepiece.)

The live view on the E-3 lets you see the scene along with the effects of adjustments of everything from focus to white balance before you take the shot. You can even zoom in 10x during live view.

While 3 inches is the new benchmark in fixed LCDs, the E-3’s 2.5-incher doesn’t give up much in the way of function. It’s 230,000-dot/77,000-pixel resolution is mid- pack (the new Sony Alpha 700 has almost twice the resolution), and it can rotate images as you rotate the camera, and also show you photos side-by-side for comparing settings and composition. Want to see the I.S. in action? You can do that, too, in live view.

As good as the live view is, for the most part, I stuck to the optical viewfinder. If the old E-1 gave photographers the impression that a tunnel-vision viewfinder was the price of a Four Thirds System DSLR, the E-3 completely dispels that notion. Twenty percent larger than the E-1’s, the E-3’s finder is big, bright, and backed by a pentaprism that serves up a high eyepoint and 100 percent accuracy.

SERIOUS CONTROL

If you’re used to a mode dial that lets you get lazy and turn to the little running man for a sports shot, or the mountain for a landscape, well, forget it. The E-3 is more serious than that. But if you want virtually total control, this is your camera.

The body is festooned with more than 20 buttons and dials, along with an encyclopedia of menus. Sound daunting? It can be if you’re not willing to put in some time. But it doesn’t take long to see that there are three big advantages:

You can adjust almost anything — from AF with manual or without manual override to an underwater macro setting.You can find a way that is most comfortable for you — since there are several ways to make most common adjustments.With practice, you’ll get really fast at getting the settings you want.

Exposure compensation? That’s a typical button-press and dial turn. But you also can use the spotmeter’s highlight control and shadow control to add or subtract exposure. Say, for instance, you’re shooting a bright background and want to add some exposure to keep the whites from turning gray. Switch to highlight control, put the spotmeter on a white target, and shoot. The gray is gone. Vice versa for shadow control.

Color settings from muted to vivid (which I used for the pastels of Old Juan) are easily reached, as are gradations that give you a high-key (brightly lit) or low-key (heavily shadowed) look.

FLASH OF BRILLIANCE

Perhaps the most fascinating controls are those that let you take charge of the new FL-50R. With this wireless flash, Olympus moves into the big leagues, as it lets you control the flash output from the camera on any or all of four channels. I used it for side light in portraits, and to brighten a Volkswagen Beetle that was parked in the shadows of an otherwise bright setting. While the system can control a couple hundred flashes, I can see how three or four could give you enough pop to light just about every small- to mid-sized scene.

This flash shows how serious Olympus is about building out its DSLR system. And it is indeed a system, with an ever-expanding line of lenses. I spent at least half my time in Puerto Rico with the 8mm f/3.5 Zuiko fisheye on the E-3. The 35mm equivalent of a 16mm thanks to the 2x lens factor of the Four Thirds System, this gorgeous piece of glass serves up sharpness along with all the bowed distortion that makes a fisheye such a great creative tool.

After all, I didn’t go all the way to Puerto Rico just to come home with the same pictures as everyone else.

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In the predawn darkness of 5 a.m., nearly 1,000 people stand in a circle, their white robes reflecting the glow of the candle that each holds. In the center, priests in elaborate, many-hued robes and huge pillbox hats lead prayers over a golden replica of the Ark of the Covenant. Suddenly, the priests turn and start walking. The faithful follow, candles in hand, chanting eerily beautiful prayers in a language totally foreign to Western ears. The procession winds around town as the sun rises.

It’s just another morning in Axum, Ethiopia.

This scene is repeated each day during the first week of every month. And in Ethiopia, there are 13 months. There also is a whole other way of keeping time — what we call 7 a.m. is 1 o’clock here. And lunch is served at 7 (our 1 p.m.). It’s also 1999.

If you’re getting the idea that this East African nation of 75 million is unusual, you don’t know the half of it. The only country in sub-Saharan Africa that wasn’t conquered by Europe’s colonial powers (aside from an uneasy occupation by the Italians during the Mussolini era), Ethiopia marches to its very own drummer. And that’s what makes it such an amazing place to photograph.

The Peace Dividend

The civil war and famine of the late 1980s, as well as more recent battles and saber-rattling with the breakaway state of Eritrea and fighting in neighboring Somalia, have put Ethiopia far down most travelers’ “must-see” lists. Right now, however, there’s peace, and the country is welcoming visitors to explore what is one of the world’s richest — but most unsung — historical troves. An invitation from Ethiopian Airlines brought me there, along with six other journalists. During my six-day visit, I found it to be one of the most exotic, fascinating, and photogenic places I’ve ever seen. Granted, it is a destination only for hardy travelers. Those visitors don’t mind getting inoculations before they leave home; won’t forget to take their malaria-fighting pills; and can cope with hotels that sometimes run short of hot water, or water altogether.

This is one of the poorest countries on the planet. To the scores of Ethiopians walking along any road in the countryside, as they carry jugs of water on their backs or bundles of firewood on their heads, a passing car or truck is a head-turning novelty. Many of the people outside the capital of Addis Ababa — and in the city, too — don’t have shoes; wear cast-off clothes from Europe and North America (assorted rap stars, colleges, and softball teams are represented on the ubiquitous T-shirts); and they are rail thin. And AIDS is a real presence.

Yet the fields are green, the food seemingly accessible, and the people very lively and friendly.

If I had been there only to encounter the people and photograph them, I could have easily filled my memory cards with great shots and left happy. After all, wherever we went we drew a crowd of kids eager to try out the English they study in school and clamoring for whatever I might have to give them. (“Pen, mister, please. Pen.”) But the adults weren’t grumpy or camera-shy. They found us as intriguing as we found them. All it took to get on their good side was a smile, a wave…and, okay, sometimes a pen, pencil, or a few birr (the local currency, worth about 12 cents each).

But there is much more to Ethiopia than just fantastic faces. There also are enough historic buildings, monuments, and artifacts to rival any place on the tourist-and-postcard circuit. The greatest concentration of sites is along the “Historic Route” that loops around the northwestern side of the country.

After a night in Addis Abba, a short flight took us to Bahir Dar on the shores of Lake Tana. This huge, milk-chocolate-colored lake is dotted with islands and peninsulas that are home to more than three dozen monasteries that are still in use by Ethiopian Orthodox Christian monks. Take the ferry around the lake, and you can get up close to the mummified remains of emperors from the 13th to 17th centuries in the mausoleum of the Daga Istafanos monastery. Too creepy? The beautifully painted murals in the churches of the region present more mainstream photo ops.

Lake Tana feeds the Blue Nile River. Drive 25 miles down a bumpy dirt road and spend a sweaty half-hour climbing rocky hills, and the Blue Nile Falls come into view. Nearly 1,500 feet wide and 150 feet high, this roaring cataract stands in thunderous juxtaposition to serene, green landscape.

Five hours away lies the city of Gondar, with more painted churches and a compound of 17th century palaces that stand to remind visitors that Ethiopia was once a powerful and sophisticated empire on the Red Sea. The emperors’ lion cages and a clever sauna chamber wrought from stone give you the feeling that this isn’t so much a museum as a recently abandoned ghost town.

The city of Axum, too, may be ancient, but it has a freshly discovered feeling. Archeologists estimate that just a tiny fraction of the area’s history has been uncovered. Still, there is plenty to see. There is a field of ancient stelae — towering obelisks that emperors built to signify their power. Nearby are the underground tombs of emperors; go ahead, walk in and explore. A short drive away are the ruins of what’s said to be the Queen of Sheba’s palace.

This city also is something like the Vatican City of Ethiopia, with the beautiful painting in the St. Mary of Zion Cathedral, and a nearby building that houses what Ethiopians believe is the Ark of the Covenant, the container in which Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from the mountain.

Wrought From Rock

Are Axum and Gondar and the other cities impressive? Yes, but it all pales in comparison to what you’ll see in the remote mountain village of Lalibela. Named for the 12th century king, this village is home to a series of churches that were carved into the stone mountains. As much art as architecture, these stone churches are set below ground level, since they are carved out of the stone. They are, in effect, sculptures, since most are not made of pieces, but wrought from a single huge piece of rock. And while certainly not as large as the cathedrals of Europe, these churches are several stories high and are elaborately carved.

As with most other sites in this country, the stone churches of Lalibela aren’t being exhibited, they’re being used. The typical museum’s ropes, gates, and display cases are virtually nonexistent in this country. When I was there, about all that was under glass were the remains of Lucy, the 3.18-million-year-old skeleton found in northern Ethiopia in 1974. I saw Lucy in the national museum in Addis Ababa, but she was reported to be on her way to the U.S. for a multi-city museum tour.

Everything else is before you, as though you’re the first visitor to see it. Eight-hundred-year-old manuscripts? They’re dragged out and paged through like family photo albums. Ancient crosses and the crowns of long-gone kings? They’re yours to photograph.

Put simply, Ethiopia is not merely an extraordinary cultural and historic experience, it’s also one amazing photo op.

Getting There

While Ethiopia is an incredibly tough place to explore on your own, getting there isn’t hard at all. Ethiopian Airlines (www.ethiopianairlines.com; 800-445-2733) has four flights a week from Washington, D.C.’s Dulles International to Addis Ababa. It’s a 15-hour flight with 90 minutes in Rome for refueling. Don’t let the country’s reputation for poverty scare you off the airline — it is thoroughly modern (Boeing 767s) and quite efficient. Round-trip coach airfares were running between $999 and $1,800 when I checked.

No matter how independent your spirit, you will need guides and someone to set things up locally. A good bet is Addis Ababa-based Green Land Tours (www.greenlandethiopia.com). This company has the experience and size to take care of everything from guides to hotels to in-country transportation.

Want to leave all of the arrangements to someone else? Good idea. Just make sure you go with an outfit that specializes in East Africa small-group tours. Two of the best and best-known: Abercrombie & Kent (www.abercrombiekent.com; 800-554-7016), which has a 12-day trip (from $2,995 per person, plus air) and SITA World Tours (www.sitatours.com; 800-421-5643), which offers an eight-day program (from $2,495 per person, plus air).

Other tour operators include 2Afrika, Inc. (www.2afrika.com; 866-392-0626), Journeys Unlimited (www.journeys-unlimited.com; 800-486-8359), Meticulous Tours (www.meticuloustours.com; 866-827-6151), and Somak Safaris (www.somaksafaris.com; 800-757-6625).

In any case, you can find out more about the country from the tourist board at www.tourismethiopia.org.

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