Really cool camera - my opinion on the TL220

Author's Rating:

Pros: Front LCD, touch screen, hd video, in-camera editing features, recycle bin

Cons: fingerprint prone front

The Bottom Line: 
I recommend this camera if you like a touchscreen and are interested in the front LCD.

Author's Review
This review won't cover all the specs, you can get that from samsung.com - this is my initial thoughts and "epinion" on this camera that I just got last week.  I am by no means a professional so read this only if you want a consumer opinion :) 

**This review is for the TL220, the 3" touchscreen LCD version.

I tried this out at Best Buy.  My first impression was that it was too complicated and I didn't like it.  But after about 15 minutes I started to "get to know" it better and really started liking it, so I bought it.

First, for an issue I experienced:
I purchased the camera and took it home, charged the battery fully and began using my new camera.  About 20 minutes into using the touch screen to set it up and familiarize myself more with it, I was touching around the menu system, when the screen went completely blank, the camera started to vibrate and a loud motor noise accompanied the vibration.  I pressed the on/off button but it would not turn off.   I had to open the battery compartment and disconnect the battery from it's connection to get the camera to stop this...I put the battery back in and the camera functioned normally again - but since this happened within minutes of opening a brand new camera - I exchanged it the next day for a different one....which hasn't given me any problems...this worries me on reliability, but hopefully I just got a rare bad one the first time.

What I like:
The touch screen is responsive and fun.  I like the combination of buttons and touch screen - there is a button to go from shooting to reviewing photos, as well as on/off and shutter buttons - everything else is touch screen.  After using this for a few days, going back to buttons seemed too hard somehow...once you get used to it, you can really get to where you need to go fast on this touchscreen.

I am just a novice who likes taking pictures.  But I think the pictures from this camera are very clear.  The macro mode is great, taking really clear pictures from very close.  The HD video looked really good too, on the camera, but my computer is too old to handle playing them, so I'll have to wait and see on how that looks. 

I like the editing features this has - when you take a photo and review it, you can go into edit and re-color your photo, combinations of red, green, or black and white etc.  There are a couple of special effects as well - one where snow is coming down - first it looks like a video then you pause it where you like and it creates a copy of your original.  There is a mosaic where you can blur out faces, since it recognizes faces - so you can post pictures online and blur out someone's face if they'd rather not appear on your facebook (or wherever) page.  When you do an edit, it takes a copy of your original so you don't lose your original.

Recycle bin - this is pretty interesting, if you have it turned on - it will store your recently deleted photos in the recycle bin, like a computer, so if you accidentally delete a photo you can retreive it. 

Video recording: You can pause while you're recording a video, so you can take a break without having to create a new video file - you can also zoom in and out (with the 4.8 optical zoom) while you are recording, however, the sound cuts out while you are zooming. You can record in HD 1280, 1280x720, 640x480, or 320x240.

Cool touch screen delete - there are 2 ways to delete a photo...the most obvious is touching the garbage can on the touchscreen....but you can also draw an "X" with your finger over the photo you want to delete...for some reason I find that so cool and impressive - even though it takes longer, I use that method because it's cute.  Oh, you can also scroll through photos the same way you can on an iphone by "pushing" them with your finger.  Or you can use the arrows on the touchscreen.

And of course, the best feature is the front LCD.  Perfect for taking self photos, group photos you'd like to be in, etc.  You can turn this on by using the back touchscreen or you can simply tap the front of the camera where the front LCD is.  There is also a child mode (selected in the "scenes") that plays a clown cartoon to get a child's attention so they will look at the camera.  Could even work for pets I suppose.  There is a beauty mode that is suppose to make you look good - seems pretty cool too, and is on other samsung models so isn't exclusive to this camera but I like it - you can select the level of "correction" you need.

Smart mode is good because it automatically selects the right setting for you.  I've compared smart to auto and smart does seem to take better photos most of the time. 

Smile detection - this is my first experience with this...and it really works.  When on, it will detect when someone smiles and automatically take a photo. 

What I don't like:
What I don't like is the way certain menu options aren't available - at what seems to be to be random at times... What I mean is, sometimes the flash icon isn't available - so I can't change it to be off or on.  This has happened in both the normal auto mode (not program) and the smart auto...where sometimes I can say no flash or flash and other times I cant.  Same with the burst, face detection, focus area, macro, and focus area....I've read that "sometimes certain features are not available in certain modes" but I can't seem to see it happening consistently to learn when this should be happening.  I took a picture in a dark corner while on auto and the flash didn't come on, and I couldn't manually turn it on...after going into menu or switching to another mode and back, it was available again? 

The front shiny black casing is pretty finger print prone, which makes it look all smudgy.

It takes micro sd, which is super tiny.  It was very tiny to insert, seems like it would be strange taking in and out if you use a card reader.  But you can just leave it in the camera and connect it to your computer and move files using windows explore (but be sure to go into tools and turn off the pc software or it will load that when you connect the camera). 

Final thoughts:
Overall I think this is a really cool camera - between the front LCD and the touch screen - it's a lot of fun to use and hopefully will invite other manufacturers to include front LCDs in the future.