Samsung S850

Viewfinder
Samsung omitted an optical viewfinder and went for a live view on the LCD screen instead. The S1050 uses a 3-inch monitor, while the S850’s measures 2.5 inches across. The contrast on the screen is good, and the viewing angle is fairly wide vertically and horizontally. The live view looks a little blurry when the camera is moved quickly, but it is fine for portraits. The resolution is great. The only big drawback to the live view is the grease that it collects on the monitor. Users can change the display information, through the OSD Info portion of the recording menu, to Full or Basic. Full includes a histogram, among other things. Overall, the big size and great resolution of the S1050’s and S850’s LCD screens make them great viewfinders.

LCD Screen
The LCD monitors are located in the traditional place on the left side of the back . The Samsung S1050 has a 3-inch LCD screen with 230,000 pixels. The Samsung S850 has the same resolution but on a smaller 2.5-inch screen. However, 2.5 inches isn’t that small; it is enough to see the live view and review photos. The Samsung logo sits at the bottom of the monitor. One downside is that the monitor greases up quickly with finger prints and smudges. As stated before, the displayed file information can be changed in the recording menu.

Flash
A built-in flash unit is located on the front of the camera in the top right corner. This placement means that users will have to take care not to block the flash with their fingers. However, there isn’t much space up for grabs on the front of the camera. The off-axis placement won’t just block the flash, but will look a little uneven at best. There is a distinctive bright spot slightly left of the frame’s center. The flash unit is about ¾ inch wide and about 1/3 inch tall, but it still doesn’t have much power. It reaches from 0.2-5m when the lens is at its widest, and 0.5-3m at its farthest. The following flash modes can be chosen using the left side of the multi-selector: Auto, Auto & Red-Eye Reduction, On, Slow Sync, and Off. The press release for the Samsung S1050 and S850 stated that both cameras would have a Wise Shot mode, similar to Fujifilm’s Natural Light & With Flash mode. It will snap two pictures in a row – one with flash and one without – and display them side by side. This mode, however, was not available on the pre-production model.

Zoom Lens
A 5x optical zoom lens comes on both the S1050 and S850 digital cameras. The Samsung SHD-branded lens extends in two segments from the camera body when turned on, and can move within its 7.8-39mm range. This is equivalent to 38-190mm. Even when turned off, the lens barrel protrudes about 2/3 of an inch. The lens shows a tiny amount of barrel distortion in the super macro mode, but shows less than most compact digital cameras’ lenses. The lens is controlled by the fin-like control on the top right of the back. The fin isn’t very big, so users have to push their fingers in to move the control up and down. Down accesses the wide end of the lens, and moving up zooms in on subjects. The control is surprisingly sensitive, stopping at 10 places within the 5x range. Another surprise is the available zoom in the movie mode. The whole range isn’t accessible, but it looks like about 3x optical zoom is available while recording video. The aperture range is decent, as far as I can tell (the display went a little wild when zooming in). The widest f/2.8 lets in enough light to snap good pictures indoors.