I knew I wanted a dslr that was easy to hold and use and my oly e500 meets those needs. I love taking pictures, I've got two kids so my oly is a part of my body of course!

I love how it fits in my hand, and, with the kit lens, 14-45mm, it is not too heavy to work with during a photo session. Based on other reviews of other lenses that I hope to acquire soon, it looks like this is the case for most of the lenses oly has for the 4 thirds system.

I also appreciate the easy to read manual, since this IS my first dslr camera and the camera itself has been fun and not too hard to figure out which is important to me since I took no photography classes in school and therefor am learning on my own by trial and error and research of the manual and places like this site!

Although it's true that you need to know how to take good pictures no matter what camera you get, it's probably good to know your camera and how it works as well! (I'm still playing with the apeture and shutter speeds!).