Samsung TL500

Design & Appearance

The TL500 has a rather austere look to it; this is a camera that's about taking photos, not looking stylish. But that's what a camera of this type needs, and the design is simple but effective enough to carry it off.

Size & Handling

We found that the TL500 fitted well into the hand, with the large grip on the front of the camera body providing plenty of space for the fingers to grip onto. The index finger falls naturally onto the shutter button, and the zoom control that is located around this is easy to handle; we didn't feel the camera slip when we used it. The two control dials on the top of the camera are also well located for the thumb; we could reach both easily, although this was easier when holding the camera in two hands.

The TL500 in the hand from the front and back

This dual control dial approach means that you can control a lot of options without using the buttons on the back of the camera: you can set the shooting mode, the burst mode, the self timer and the bracketing while holding the camera in one hand. This is the first camera we have seen that has this, and makes this feature-filled camera a very easy one to control.

The two control dials of the TL500: the left one controls the self-timer, the drive mode and the bracketing

Two other controls are also new: a control wheel around the 4-way control on the back of the camera, and a small scrolling wheel on the front of the camera. These are used for a number of functions; the front scroll wheel controls exposure compensation and aperture, while the control wheel on the back scrolls through menus and sets the shutter speed. Although it is a little confusing at first, this approach is very useful in manual mode, providing a quick and easy way to set both aperture and shutter speed without having to duck into menus and the like.

Menu

The TL500 uses a new menu interface that looks much like the one found on Samsung camcorders. There are two menu systems on offer: the function menu and the main menu. Pressing the function button on the bottom right corner of the camera accesses the function menu, which controls settings such as ISO, image size, etc.

The function menu of the TL500

The second menu is the main menu, accessed by pressing the menu buttons. This controls all of the features of the function menu, plus offering deeper access, such as formatting memory cards,setting focus area, etc.

The main menu of the TL500

Ease of Use

We were impressed with the ease of use of the TL500. It's a complicated camera that has a number of complicated features, but we found it to be simple to use and control in our limited time with it at the PMA show. In particular, the dual control dials on the top and the controlwheel on the front make it easy to quickly set the camera up as required.