A pocketable kit using pancake lenses only?
I have owned an em5 mark iii for the last five years, with the 12-45 f4 pro. As I am looking to upgrade, one of the things I have realized is that I want a camera setup that is as close to grab and go as possible. My camera was already small. But after giving it some thought I am realizing it is the lens that makes the camera unwieldy and away from grab and go.
The Fuji X100VI is in part so popular because it has all the right properties: ibis, weather protection and a slim profile with the lens. I need something that is a point and shoot but with the capabilities of an advanced camera, and this is pretty much the only model that has all these properties. The rocoh gr iii is small, but falls short on other properties.
Hence my idea: assemble a kit with a small camera (like the om5, even Fuji xt5 or even a7c) but with small, pancake lenses. There aren't many zoom pancake lenses at all. and the ones that exist seem to either not have good quality or are not weather protected or both. There are more prime pancakes but I am having difficulty identifying a system that has enough options to cover a reasonable standard focal length range of a standard zoom. Many primes I have found are small, but still stick out when attached to the camera so that grabbing it in one hand or stowing in a jacket pocket is awkward.
A second concern with a prime lens is that the loss of convenience of zoom lenses. I really don't want to carry and change lenses while on vacation. That's when I found out about crop zooming. Although not a new feature per se, I was totally unaware of it because my camera doesn't really support it and 20MP is not enough.
Does anybody have any experience or ideas of how I can assemble a kit that is as close to pocketable a possible, has weather protection, hopefully some image stabilization and is amenable to crop zooming in camera? I know I can crop in post but I want the zoom experience in camera because I want to frame correctly at the time of taking a picture rather than crop later .
(1) Budget, country, and currency:
USA, USD 2000
(2) What equipment, if any, you have now and why is it no longer meeting your needs?
Em5 mark iii with 12-45 f4 pro. I want smaller overall size and better low light performance.
(3) What kinds of subjects do you intend to shoot?
Family, indoor and outdoor, vacation.
(4) Is it primarily for photography, videography, or both?
Photography only.
Posted Apr 5, 2026, 2:57 AM UTC