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Samsung MV800 review

Our Rating :
Price when reviewed : £190
inc VAT

Image and video quality are nothing special, but a clever design and lots of fun shooting modes make it an attractive camera for social media addicts

Specifications

1/2.3in 16.0-megapixel sensor, 5.0x zoom (26-130mm equivalent), 140g

http://www.jessops.com

Samsung’s camera designers aren’t afraid to innovate. Their latest creation is a stylish metal clamshell camera with a screen that rotates through 180 degrees for self-portraits. Articulated screens are hardly new but the way this one opens up like a book is certainly eye-catching. Because it’s hinged at the top, it also doubles as a stand, allowing the camera to be placed on a table or other surface and tilted up at an angle. The hinged screen also makes it easy to shoot from waist height, or overhead by turning the camera upside down.

Samsung MV800
The articulated rear screen allows for many creative shooting options

Opening the screen right out for self-portraits obscures the shutter button, but Samsung has thoughtfully added another on the back of the camera. It’s a natural evolution of Samsung’s 2View cameras with their front- and rear-mounted screens, but the MV800’s articulated screen works better because it gives a bigger screen for self-portraits.

The touchscreen controls resemble a smartphone more than a camera. A physical Home button reveals five pages of icons that present shooting modes in the style of apps. These include lots of fun features including artistic filters such as Soft Focus, Old Film and Cartoon, plus fun frames including a magazine cover, a TV and the moon. Funny Face mode uses face detection and digital distortion to skew faces, giving them big noses, alien eyes and even letting you rearrange features manually on the touchscreen. This all happens in the live preview, and will go down a storm with children. Shame it’s not possible to record a Funny Face video. There’s also a basic photo editor for cropping, colour correcting and applying creative filters, plus a collage maker.

Samsung MV800 samples
…and this is meant to make me look like a professor? – click to enlarge

Smart Auto and Program modes are there too, and give a more familiar photographic experience. Here, the MV800 is unremarkable. Performance was pedestrian at 2.2 seconds between shots, rising to nine seconds with the flash at full power. Photographic settings were slow to access via the touchscreen interface, and the 0.6fps continuous mode is hardly worth bothering with.

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Basic Specifications

Rating ***
CCD effective megapixels 16.0 megapixels
CCD size 1/2.3in
Viewfinder none
Viewfinder magnification, coverage N/A
LCD screen size 3.0in
LCD screen resolution 288,000 pixels
Articulated screen Yes
Live view Yes
Optical zoom 5.0x
Zoom 35mm equivalent 26-130mm
Image stabilisation optical, lens based
Maximum image resolution 4,608×3,456
Maximum movie resolution 1280×720
Movie frame rate at max quality 30fps
File formats JPEG; MP4 (AVC)

Physical

Memory slot MicroSDHC
Mermory supplied 10MB internal
Battery type Li-ion
Battery Life (tested) 200 shots
Connectivity USB, micro HDMI
HDMI output resolution 1080i
Body material aluminium
Lens mount N/A
Focal length multiplier N/A
Kit lens model name N/A
Accessories USB cable
Weight 140g
Size 56x93x22mm

Buying Information

Warranty one year RTB
Price £190
Supplier http://www.jessops.com
Details www.samsung.com/uk

Camera Controls

Exposure modes auto
Shutter speed auto
Aperture range f/3.3 (wide), f/5.9 (tele)
ISO range (at full resolution) 100 to 3200
Exposure compensation +/-2 EV
White balance auto, 5 presets, manual
Additional image controls N/A
Manual focus No
Closest macro focus 5cm
Auto-focus modes multi, centre, flexible spot, face detect, tracking
Metering modes multi, centre-weighted, centre, face detect
Flash auto, forced, suppressed, slow synchro, red-eye reduction
Drive modes single, continuous, self-timer, AE bracket, smile detect