Samsung’s Galaxy S4 family has a number of curious handsets, none
more so than the Galaxy S4 Zoom. On one side it’s a regular Samsung
Android handset, on the other it’s a point and shoot camera, with a hand
grip, twisty lens, and a physical shutter button. Have the two sides
come together in a perfect union, or is this just a design experiment
too far?First question, which is the dominant side of the hardware. Is the Galaxy Zoom a solid point-and-shoot camera which has a smartphone grafted to the back for easier uploading and manipulation of photos, or is it an Android smartphone which has delusions of being a camera that can be mentioned in the same breath as the Canon S100 pro-sumer point and shoot?
I’m not sure what Samsung’s developers had in mind, but having used the Galaxy Zoom for the last week or so, I’m firmly in the camp that this is trying to be a camera first, and an Android phone second.
That’s mostly down to the size of the handset – with the optical zoom assembly and the camera grip like bulge at the base of the unit (or the right hand camera edge, depending on which side you look at first). That extra sizes gives the Zoom a touch more battery capacity than the S4 mini (1900 mAh to 2330 mAh) which is welcome. Using the Zoom as ‘just’ a smartphone and it gets through the day (unlike the Mini), but once you start seriously using the camera the battery is again struggling to make it through a full day’s use. Thankfully it is user replaceable, and as most professional photographers will be used to carrying spare batteries this isn’t too far out of the realm of expectations – if the Zoom is seen as a camera first.
Let’s talk briefly about the Android side of things. Running Samsung’s latest version of Android with the South Korean’s TouchWiz interface, it feels very similar to the Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini (reviewed here on Forbes), with the same 540×960 qHD screen of 4.3 inches, 1.5 GB Ram, and 8GB of on board storage. There’s support for a microSD card for extra storage (and given the focus here is on imaging, that makes a lot of sense).
Without going into too much details, the Galaxy Zoom’s implementation of Android is as standard as Samsung can make it, with all the same brickbats and bouquets that I’ve discussed in previous reviews of the Mini, the Mega, and the regular S4 – the labyrinthine settings menus, the duplication of functions between Samsung branded apps and the Android defaults, are two that spring to mind.2
Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom
That’s not to say that it can beat a digital SLR, because it’s a long way from that standard. In most cases it doesn’t beat the high end point and shoot cameras (such as the aforementioned Canon S100). The specifications may be high for a smartphone, but the 16 megapixel 1/2.33 inch BSI CMOS sensor is on the small side when compared to a range of cameras.
Samsung have packed in many of the shooting modes that were found in the Galaxy S4, twenty six are present in total. There is an auto mode which lets the software make the best choices for you, or you can let the ‘smart mode suggest’ choose out three or four modes which the software feels are appropriate.
If you want to tweak any more, then the Expert mode allows access to colour modes, control over white balance, ISO, light meters, and all the other fiddly stuff that you would expect in a professional camera.
But this is not a professional camera. The small sensor and frankly average optics may be able to out-shoot the other Android handsets on the market, but put it next to dedicated cameras and the difference is clear. The Galaxy Zoom has some relatively noisy pictures, and the ISO tends to be racked up higher than an equivalent standalone camera. The automatic modes seem to prefer a little more exposure than is needed, washing color out of images.
I don’t think the Galaxy Zoom is going to have many professionals rushing out to buy the handset – shots feel about as detailed and accurate as a £100-£150 point and shoot camera – which is not to be sneezed at, but it’s certainly not what you expect when you are paying over £330 for a smartphone/camera combination. Just because a basic phone has an LTE smartphone attached to it does not make it a best seller.
Neither do I think the majority of smartphone buyers are going to be so determined to buy a smartphone with a really good camera that they’ll take on board the awkward shape of the Galaxy Zoom and the problems it will have in being carried in your pocket. The picture quality offered by devices like the Lumia 925, the iPhone 5, and the regular Galaxy S4 will be more than enough for them.
Which leaves a very small ground in the middle of people who would want to pick up this phone. I honestly don’t think that there are a lot of people in this group, and I would not expect the Galaxy Zoom to be a big seller. The cynic in me thinks that Samsung has released the handset simply so they could say “we have a smartphone with a x10 optical zoom” in press releases and investor statements, without having to worry about the sales figures.
The phone side of the Galaxy Zoom is competent, as is the camera side of things if you lower your expectations slightly. The Galaxy Zoom is a great idea, and I could see people lusting over it in a wacky model kind of way, but I’d be hard pushed to recommend this handset on a two year contract to the general population.
If you feel you need this level of image zoom and detail, then by all means consider the Galaxy Zoom, because there is nothing else like it on the market. It’s the very definition of a niche product done well. The question for Samsung, and retailers, is how big the niche actually is? Is it enough to cover the development costs of the Galaxy Zoom, or will the regular Galaxy S4 be supporting those costs? I suspect the latter, but I’m glad Samsung have tried something a bit out of the ordinary with this handset.
This review handset was provided by UK retailer Dialaphone, who stock the Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom for sale on the UK mobile phone networks.
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