S4 Zoom's got a split personality

On one side, Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom looks like a compact digital camera with a retractable zoom lens. But on the other side, it looks exactly like a Galaxy S4 smart mini-phone.

So you might regard it as a camera that allows you to make a phone call or a smart phone that looks like and functions like a good-quality digital compact camera with a full-size retractable lens, not an embedded lens like most phones.

Actually, it is both. Samsung says its S4 Zoom was designed to straddle both worlds.

Funnily enough, it goes by different names depending on which side is facing you. The front of the camera is the back of the phone. So, to avoid confusion, I’ll call the camera attached to the 10x zoom lens “the main camera” and the other camera on the phone display, used for self-portraits, “the sub-camera”.

The main camera uses a 16 megapixel BSI (Backside-illuminated) CMOS censor while the sub-camera has 1.9 megapixel resolution.

S4 Zoom has the same-sized display with the S4 mini, using 4.3-inch qHD Super AMOLED screen with 960x540 pixel resolution. S4 Zoom nearly has the same size body with S4 Mini but is a little bit larger and much thicker and weighs more. And it’s very good that its display is protected by Corning’s new Gorilla Glass 3 with Native Damage Resistance.

As a smart phone, S4 Zoom is a powerful one as it is powered by 1.5 GHz dual-core processor and it runs on Android 4.2 operating system with intuitive TouchWiz user-interface from Samsung.

It has 1.5 gigabytes of active memory or RAM for handling apps and 8 GB of internal storage, which is expandable with a microSD card of additional storage of up to 64 GB.

It supports all 3G operators in Thailand because it uses HSPA+ 3G bandwidth of 850 MHz, 900 MHz, 1900 MHz and 2100 MHz.

S4 Zoom has all the features and functions like S4 Mini, plus Photo Suggest app that that you can use to view photos take by other users of interest points near your current location. You can then used suggested photos as guides for shooting the same or similar places.

I tested S4 Zoom on TrueMove H’s HSPA+ network and had no problem working with the internet features of the smart phone. The apps were downloaded and installed or updated fast. Taken shots could be uploaded to my Facebook wall fast. And the touch-screen and menus of the phone were very responsive.

As a compact digital camera, S4 Zoom takes quality snapshots, especially in well-lit environment or when you select proper light-metering spots for the shots or choose exposure modes suitably for the scenes.

And with the optical image stabiliser technology, S4 Zoom definitely takes much better quality shots than smart phones.

Best of all, it comes with 24mm wide-angle lens that captures beautiful landscape shots and with the 10x optical zoom, it has up to 240mm focal length that allows you to zoom in on and get up close to your subjects from far away.

But the lens’ aperture start with f/3.1 of the wide-angle focal length and drops to f/6.3 at the 240mm focal length, so you’d better take shots in well lit environment or use auto flash option indoors. Although it uses a backside-illuminate sensor, its lens aperture, whose width is less than f/2.8, means the camera needs proper lighting to get sharp shots.

I found that the S4 Zoom captured beautiful and sharp landscape photos in a well-lit environment with well saturated colours. Portrait shots were also beautiful.

The camera was intuitive to control and use. It uses a touch-screen for changing various shooting parameters and the control is a ring you rotate by touching the screen.

When you are in the middle of a phone call, you can twist the zoom ring to activate the In-call Photo Share feature that lets you capture a photo and send it via MMS to your phone conversation partner.

And when the S4 Zoom is in smart phone standby mode, you can twist the zoom ring to activate the Quick Launch that lets you select shooting modes. 

You can also use the soft zoom in and out touch keys on the screen.

It’s nice that the interface provides easy access to various effects – Vignette, Greyscale, Sepia, Vintage, Cartoon, Oil pastel and Fisheye.

The shooting modes are divided into four groups, selected with the on-screen ring: Auto, Expert, Smart and My Mode.

I found that the camera mostly selected scenes correctly for surrounding conditions. If you want to use Multi AF to focus on multiple areas, you must select shooting modes in the group of Expert shooting modes. There are three: Colour Wizard, Programme exposure (P) and Manual.

If you are an experienced photographer, you will enjoy the P mode that gives you more control. With Colour Wizard you can adjust the colours in the shots by changing the EV (brightness), saturation, contrast and sharpness. My Mode contains your favourite modes. You can edit and group up to five.

The fun part of S4 Zoom is the Smart modes. A useful one is called Suggest, which will display three options when you half-depress the shutter button. If you select none, the camera stays in Auto mode. Women will love Beauty Fade, which lightens and smoothes the subject’s face.

Best Face is a night cheat. The camera will take multiple photos of a group and let you manually select the best shot of each individual to merge into one perfect shot – everyone smiling and in focus.

In Rich Tone (HDR), the camera will take several photos at various exposure values and merge them into one so you capture all the details. Waterfall mode turns cascades into white trails of water, but requires a tripod.

The most fun mode is Drama mode, although it reduces resolution to only 896x504 pixels. The camera will take multiple shots of a moving subject and seamlessly merge them into one, with up to four images visible to simulate a trail of action.

S4 Zoom is ready to take the first shot in less than two seconds after you tap the icon of camera app and I didn’t feel shutter lag.

Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom has a suggested retail price of Bt15,800.

 

 

Key specs

_ OS:Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean)

_ Network: GSM: 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz; 3G (HSPA+): 850 / 900 / 1900 / 2100 MHz

_ Display: 4.3 inch qHD Super AMOLED (960x540pixels) touch-screen

_ CPU: 1.5 GHz Dual-Core Processor

_ Main camera: 16 Mega pixel with x10 Optical Zoom with 24-240mm, F3.1-F6.3 lens

_ Sub camera: 1.9 Mega pixel camera

_ ISO: Auto, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200

_ Video Recording & Playback: Full HD (1920x1080 30p)

_ Connectivity: Wi-Fi a/b/g/n 5GHz, NFC, Bluetooth 4.0 (LE), A-GPS + GLONASS

_ Sensor: Accelerometer, Geomagnetic, Proximity, Gyro, RGB Light

_ Memory: 1.5GB RAM

_ Internal storage: 8GB Internal memory, expandable with microSD slot (up to 64GB)

_ Battery: 2,330mAh

_ Dimension: 125.5 x 63.5 x 15.4 mm

_ Weight: 208g (with standard battery)