The Samsung WB1000 is a lovely looking camera. The Korean gadget king has gone all out on the design front with an all-metal chassis, the blue ring styling around the camera lens, and the leather-feel hand-grip. But is this just a fashionable gimmick? Read our full Samsung WB1000 review for the complete lowdown.
Let’s face it, those dials up top do make the Samsung WB1000 look the part. Our personal favourites are the two gauges on the top of the camera, which are supposed to look like the gas and speedometer on a car. Instead they show how much battery you have left and how full your memory card is. OK so it’s gimmicky, but it is also bound to inspire gasps of wonder from impressed pals.
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But it’s not all about looks. The 12 megapixel Samsung WB1000 packs in a plethora of features – a 24mm ultra wide angle, 5x optical zoom lens, dual image stabilisation, face detection and blink detection. There are also 13 scene modes, which you can quickly access using the Scene option on the main dial on the top of the camera. From here, you can also set aperture or shutter priority, auto, smart auto (which picks one of the scene options automatically) and the video option, which delivers 720p HD content recording at 30 frames per second. And video really does look good on this camera’s 3 inch AMOLED screen, which has a whopping 10,000:1 contrast ratio. There is also an HDMI connection if you are so proud of your snaps and footage that you want to subject the whole family to a show.
It is, however, the manual and semi-manual options that really set the Samsung WB1000 apart. In manual mode, you can play around with white balance, image temperature, ISO, aperture, shutter speeds and as well as contrast, sharpness and saturation post-capture.
But, despite the great feature set, the Samsung WB1000 didn’t perform well at high ISOs. In fact, a little note in the menu even warns that the noise may increase. OK it’s not something that affected the majority of shots but was just a shame in what is otherwise a fantastic and stylish offering.
