Samsung ST50

The technical spec on Samsung's ST50 doesn't reveal any major innovations: a 12 Megapixel sensor, 3x zoom lens with no wide angle, a 3 inch screen ... Its main strong point, in fact, is how small it is. At less than 1.5 cm thick from from the lens to the screen, it will slide easily into any pocket.

Handling

The ST50 is astonishingly well-built for a camera in this range. The fixtures are faultless, and every part of this camera has a solid feel. The covers over the memory card and battery open and close firmly, and even the lens is solid as it slides in and out. Only the cover over the combined USB/power/audio-video port is lacking, with just a small piece of rubber to hold it in place. It's tight enough when it's closed but less so when open.

Holding the camera is enjoyable. Despite making the ST50 so thin, Samsung has decided to keep the zoom control around the shutter release, which is a good choice. The back of the camera is relatively simple with a switch to flip easily from video to photo mode.

The screen's resolution is of little interest, and is quite glossy and therefore difficult to use outside. The viewing angles are acceptable for the price range we're in.


All in all, this camera is a joy to handle despite the absence of a dedicated handle. Your thumb rests naturally enough on the switch to move between photo and video mode and the counterweight of the main body of the camera is enough to keep it balanced, even in just one hand.

The fact that both modes work in a similar way is also helpful. In both photo and video mode, there's a difference between the intelligent mode, in which the camera automatically adjusts its settings based on what it's photographing or filming (with results that are acceptable, even if a little less refined than those achieved in Panasonic's intelligent Auto mode) and various programmes, with different settings in each (see inset). Navigating the menus, which are simple and attractively-designed, is a treat.

This camera works at a decent speed, without being extraordinary. Autofocus is about average, largely thanks to the continuous focus mode that works well. When you want to zoom, though, you need to wait for this special pre-focus to engage before releasing the shutter; if the ST50 hasn't finished adjusting the autofocus after the zoom level has changed, then pressing the shutter release blocks the camera and you need to start over again.

The last small problem is that the camera's electronics, to the right of the screen, tend to get very hot. The case is so thin that you can feel the heat against your hand after just a few minutes. At one point, we measured the temperature on the front of the camera at 37 °C.

Image Quality

Samsung's cameras have shown us some of the very best and the very worst results when it comes to the photos they take. In the case of the ST50, the lens certainly does its job: photos are reasonably sharp at low sensitivities. Things are less sharp in the corners of the frame, of course, but hardly dreadful.

The sensor, with its now-standard 12 Megapixels, is less impressive. As soon as you reach 400 ISO, blurriness obscures most details. Things get worse at 800 ISO, although electronic noise is better handled here. Strangely, our shots at 1600 ISO seemed less blurry and to suffer from a lot less interference. We'd rather forget about what it was like at 3200 ISO, where the photos were exteremely noisy, despite going down to 3 Megapixels.

Having no image stabilisation really counts against the ST50. Even at 1600 ISO, it was impossible to get a decent portrait shot of Barbie.


In video mode, you have the choice between higher resolution or a higher framerate: you can either go for SVGA 800 x 592 at 20 fps, or 640 x 480 at 30 fps. The images aren't anything special, with an almost clichéd white balance indoors that doesn't look at all authentic. You can use zoom, but to avoid capturing the sound of the zoom lens unfolding, the microphone immediately stops recording.