Preview based on a pre-production NX100 Samsung Samsung was the first company outside of the Consortium Micro Four Thirds mirrorless camera to release an interchangeable lenses. The NX10 DSLR-separately as little fuss about its construction mirrorless, focusing instead on offering capbilities family and the behavior of a smaller body with small lenses. Now its sister model, the NX100 has a slightly different approach-eschews the traditional style of NX10 and embraces the simplest silhouette of a compact camera. And, although its minimalism design makes it look a bit monolithic, is almost identical in size to his peers obvious-the Panasonic GF1 and Olympus E-P 2.More compact dimensions of the camera has a sense of Samsung's previously-announced 20-50 mm F3.5-5.6 zoom lens ' compact ' which comes alongside NX100. It is a retractable zoom that recall the kit 14-42 mm zoom lens for Micro Four Thirds Olympus. Is not the image stabilised and, starting from 30 mm equivalent, it's not quite as flexible as most zoom kit (which tend to begin 27 or 28 mm equiv), but this means that the package remains small and nice camera with zoom mounted.The underlying specification is quite similar to the NX10-uses the same sensor 14.6 megapixel, battery and beautiful OLED screen VGA-equivalent, but you gain a range of features and tweaks that owners of NX10 hopes to receive future firmware updates. However there is a significant omission-the NX100 do not have a built-in flash.Probably the biggest gain is that Samsung has a feature called i-function. The two lenses launched alongside NX100-there is a 20 mm F2.8 prime as well as the 20-50 mm-both have a button ' iFn ' on their left sides allowing the focus rings be used to control the various camera functions. Depending on the shooting mode iFn can be used to adjust the compensation speed, Aperture and shutter exposure with the option of adding ISO and white balance, depending on how you plan to use the camera.In addition, there are a number of changes which make the camera more customizable-the option to select the highest value of ISO that your camera uses in Auto ISO, for example. In itself, these are minor changes, but are the types of options that allow users to better adapt the camera to their way of working, we would like to see.
Alongside NX100, Samsung has launched a range of accessories including a flashgun, GPS units and EVF that slot on the back of the camera.
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The NX10's closest competitor is the Panasonic G2 - both are 'SLR style' models with built-in viewfinders and proper external controls. Despite a slightly longer flange-back distance (25.5mm vs 20mm) the NX10 is a considerably more slimline affair. It has a smaller, lower-res viewfinder but offers a larger, higher resolution OLED display, rather than the G2's touch-sensitive, articulated LCD.Samsung NX10 Key Features15.1 Megapixel APS-C CMOS sensor (presumed to be close relation to Pentax K7 sensor)14.6 million effective pixelsNew Samsung NX mount (25.5mm flange-back distance)720p movie capture (H.264, 30 fps)Contrast-detect autofocus3.0" AMOLED screen (614,000 dots, PenTile RGB array)921k dot Electronic Viewfinder30mm F2 pancake and 18-55mm standard zoom options
The current pin-ups of the Micro Four Thirds crowd, the Olympus PEN series, created the biggest buzz of 2009 thanks to their unique retro styling (and by the mere fact that the PEN E-P1 was the first rangefinder style mirrorless interchangeable camera). Looked at from above you can see that the NX10 is considerably bulkier, but crucially (for future development) the body itself (forgetting the protruding bits) isn't a lot thicker - the flange-back distance is only 5mm more. The larger sensor doesn't by necessity mean larger cameras (the NX10 is smaller than the Panasonic G1), but - as you can see above - it does make for slightly larger lenses.As 2010 gets underway, Olympus and Panasonic no longer have the mirrorless interchangeable lens market to themselves. As well as the Samsung NX10, Sony recently announced (at this year's PMA show in Anaheim) its intention to create a mirrorless interchangeable-lens camera as well. The forthcoming Sony offering, like the NX10, will feature an APS-C sensor too. How the market evolves remains to be seen, but for now, it's all very exciting. Samsung describes NX as a 'hybrid' system (there's still no consensus on nomenclature for this new category of camera) that (to quote the original press release) offers "the performance and image quality of a DSLR and the portability and convenience of a compact point-and-shoot". So far, so Micro Four Thirds with a bigger sensor.
As with Micro Four Thirds the key to NX is that it allows the cameras to be slimmer by removing the mirror box and optical viewfinder and replacing them with an all-live view system (using the sensor itself to display a preview image on the screen or electronic viewfinder). The flange-back (lens mount to sensor) distance is reduced by around 40% to 25.5mm, the lens mount itself is shrunk and the net result is a camera with an SLR-sized sensor and interchangeable lenses, but in a considerably smaller package.For Samsung, a company with little experience in optics but an awful lot of experience in solid-state electronics it's also a way to make a system camera that contains little, if any legacy technology and very few moving parts. Digital SLRs use a sometimes awkward pairing of cutting edge electronics and decades-old mechanical systems harking back to the days of film, whereas these new 'hybrid' system cameras are designed and built from the bottom up as purely digital devices. It's our understanding that they're also a lot cheaper for a company like Samsung and Panasonic to make than anything requiring a precision engineered fast-moving mirror and reflex viewfinder.At present, the NX system is fairly small, but five more lenses are on the way, including a 20mm pancake, a 60mm macro, and a new 18-200mm 'superzoom'. For now though, the NX system comprises the following:NX10 bodyThree lenses (30mm, 18-55mm, and 50-200mm)Dedicated flashguns (SEF20A or SEF42A)Various cases, straps and cables
Samsung innovation Creates line slim and ultra-compact design to suit any occasion
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