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February 24, 2006 – Joining the onslaught of recent camera announcements is Samsung, who introduced the Digimax L85 and L60 digital cameras as part of its Prestige series today. With 8 megapixels and a 5x zoom lens, the L85 is the new flagship of the series. One of its main features is its High Definition Multimedia Interface which allows users to display images from the camera on high-definition televisions without any loss of quality. The Samsung L85 is the first digital camera to have this feature, and it will be available to users for $499 in April. The L60 has 6 megapixels and a 3x zoom lens; it will retail for $299 in the same month.
Both digital cameras have revamped movie modes that record 640 x 480 pixels at a rate of 30 frames per second. The L85 and L60 offer digital image stabilization and zoom functionality while recording movies. Users can also extract still frames from video, merge several video clips into a single file and perform other simple editing tasks. Both Digimax cameras house 32 MB of internal memory. They have photo framing and color effects and also have the same 11 scene modes.
In addition, the Samsung L85 has manual, shutter priority and aperture priority modes. The 8 megapixel L85 has a Schneider-Kreuznach 5x zoom lens and its highly touted High Definition Multimedia Interface. For better viewing and playback, this digital camera has a 2.5-inch LCD screen with 230,000 pixels and a wide viewing angle.
The Samsung Digimax L85 is quite stylish looking with its black body and silver highlights. The design is simple but still modern and sleek. A mode dial on top provides quick access to the manual, priority and automatic modes. The L85 also offers a My Set mode where users can save their most frequently used settings. There is also a voice memo feature that saves audio clips with still image files.
"At Samsung Camera we are committed to providing the consumer with the latest technology, such as the first HDMI in a digital still camera, at an affordable price," said Stewart Henderson, national marketing manager at Samsung Opto-Electronics America, in today’s press release. "By combining our technology with Schneider optics users can now capture and then display their photos with breathtaking clarity."
Samsung’s L60 doesn’t have the high-definition functionality, but still offers decent imaging specs with its 6 megapixels and SHD 3x zoom lens. The L60 keeps all the same movie mode functionality and 11 scene modes, but does not include any manual or priority modes. The Samsung L60 has a very plain silver body with no mode dial. Instead, this Digimax has an ‘M’ button to switch between still and video recording. The L60 has a 2.4-inch LCD screen that doubles as a viewfinder and a playback device. Trimming, resizing and rotating are built-in editing features on the Samsung Digimax L60.
"The Prestige line is perfect for the step-up user who desires high-quality optics but with easy-to-use features," Henderson said. "And after extensive market research we developed a sleek, ergonomic body design with features such as MPEG4 video recording in a compact package."