Samsung i8 Compact Digital Camera

Samsung i8 Compact Digital Camera

By Sutlej Soin & Seow Tein Hee

Some people are under the impression that low price equals low quality. While that statement may ring true for some products, the Samsung i8 begs to differ, encased in an attractive rectangular design with smooth rounded corners that fits comfortably into the palm of your hand in a variety of colors including pink and blue.

Portraying the Fun

As the direct successor to the Samsung i7, the i8, being a relatively new introduction to Samsung�s lineup of compact digital cameras, looks worlds apart from the former. Slimmer and without any protruding features, the i8 sets the tone for a fun-loving compact camera, which is precisely what this camera is all about.

The i8 comes with a standard 3x optical zoom, which ought to suffice in most conditions today, and is accompanied by a 2.7-inch LCD screen, which takes up most of the real estate at the rear. The absence of a function dial is remedied with the clustered and small control buttons. Navigating the controls is easy enough, with the main menu clearly organized into different sections, using just the navigation pad to scroll through the lists.

Beyond the Call of (Camera) Duty
Though the i8 may not be as feature-heavy as the Samsung NV Series' Schneider-Kreuznach lenses, it manages to throw a bit of weight around with its Samsung-made lens and several fancy features tucked nicely under its belt such as built-in MP3 player, movie viewer, voice recorder, text viewer and a world tour guide that provides key information on tourists� hot spots in over 29 countries. This should prove to be a time killer and helpful in your travel plans on foreign soil. Other features on the i8 include face detection as well as photo enhancers which fix red-eye, contrast adjustment, scene modes like backlight, landscape and more.

For landscape or portrait shots, the 8.2-megapixel sensor delivered good amounts of detail and color saturation on its images. In terms of resolution, the i8 does expectedly well with a resolution reading of 12 on both the horizontal and vertical axis on our ISO Resolution Chart.

Besides being able to shoot MPEG-4 videos at 800 x 592 resolution, the i8 is also touted as portable media player, allowing you to watch MPEG, AVI, MOV, WMV and ASF files right on the LCD, with MP3 playback to boot. The only setback users might face is the need to encode videos using the bundled Samsung software and in turn copying them over to the i8. The built-in 190MB of internal memory might be enough for occasional snapshots, but our recommendation is to stick with the removable SD media for your multimedia files.

Concluding Thoughts

At a very affordable and attractive price of S$389, the Samsung i8 is a fun camera that has enough shooting power and special features to make it a useful tool for camera amateurs and buyers on a budget alike. In short, the i8 manages to produce relatively impressive digital snapshots, marrying both quality and affordability under one device for the consumer's photography and multimedia needs and wants.