Let’s remember a day with the K45

Samsung camcorders have started with the pocket type camcorder VM-300 in 2007 with UCC boom, and the shooting type memory camcorder 480p MX10 and HD camcorder HMX10A were also known to us. Particularly, the success of the HMX20 in 2008 is so cool. This model has made Samsung camcorders more popular until 2009, and thanks to this model, following family camcorders could be released. In 2009, Samsung have been releasing a lot of products with a lot of concepts such as an album for children, easy recording, my diary, and family.

Active angle Full-HD camcorder R10, Capsule type small camcorder C10, Samsung has kind of threatened the No.1 Sony in camcorder with the Full HD H106 having the world’s first SSD memory and OIS. They start the second half of 2009 with the SSD memory camcorder SMX-K45 which converts SD to Full HD 1080p.

Converting SD to Full HD quality.

The SMX-K series is divided into the SMX-K45/K44/K40 by the internal memory. The K45 and K44 have 32 and 16GB SSD memory, while the K40 has no internal memory, but supports SD/SDHC memory. The biggest feature of the K45 series is the up-scaling from 480i to 1080p when watching in HDTV. Today’s model is the SMX-K45 having 32GB of SSD memory.

Optical 52x zoom and Intelli 65x zoom with OIS are remarkable. Intelli-Studio to upload videos on YouTube is included, and interval shot, 120 minutes of battery life, and various additional functions are supported with this charming camcorder.

The SSD memory which was applied for the first time to H series is very good for long time recording, low power consumption, compact, and stability. The most important feature is the up-scaling SD quality images to Full-HD quality images.

Up-scaling Full HD by connecting to HD-TV

Playing a movie in great Full-HD quality

Taking SD quality and playing Full HD. It’s such a great idea. The actual quality is really awesome. Of course, taking Full HD and playing Full HD is the best, but this can make you enjoy more fun with less space.

There are a lot of camcorders to convert 30fps 60i to 60p, but the Samsung K45 series is the first camcorder converting 720×480i to 1080p.

To really enjoy the up-scaled quality, you should have included HDMI cable and HD TV. Connect the camera to a HDTV using the HDMI cable. That’s it. The real quality is totally different from 720×480 in a PC. There’s no horizontal line showing interlace, and the quality is incomparable to normal SD.

The quality is not as high as Full HD by the H106, but there’s more than just watching normal HD camcorder. In a short distance, you might feel some rough details, but from 1-2m distance, it’s really vivid. This up-scaling is not just increasing the size of pixels. It’s Samsung’s own algorithm.

Optical 52x, Intelli 65x zoom + OIS Schneider Lens

Design based on lens and Fast speed

Normally, SD camcorders, especially supporting high zoom, only have a high zoom function with digital IS and worse quality in tele angle, so the value of high zoom gets worse, because these camcorders should be small at a reasonable price with a high zoom function as a main feature. The K45 has OIS (Optical Image Stabilization) and designed based on design, so it’s not an ultra compact type, but still compact and it has 52x zoom and 230g of weight. The 32GB of SSD memory also makes better mobility than HDD.

 

Intelli 65x zoom

The actual optical zoom is 52x, and together with the Intelli zom, it becomes 65x. It’s an extremely high zoom. Using this on a sunny day not indoors, you can feel this powerful zoom feature much more.

 

52X zoom (High speed zooming)

3 levels of zooming speed adjustment is good, and the high speed zooming is so fast. When using the maximum tele angle, there’s quality degradation such as some chromatism, but it’s still much better than other high zoom popularized camcorders. It seems it’s because of the comparably high caliber lens.

 

Mid tele OIS on

OIS is remarkably effective. Not for maximum tele angle, but for medium tele angle, the effect is the best. Getting more telephoto angles, it fixes the shake more smoothly. Thanks to that, you can record the play of famous sport players in a stadium with the 65x zoom.

 

More than 20 hours of recording with the internal SSD

SSD memory which was firstly applied to the H106 has advantages in compact & light size, low power consumption, low noise, stability in high/low temperature condition, durability, and permanency. The K45 can take up to 20 hours with the 32GB memory. (Standard quality for web 640×480) This is sufficient to record for a few days. The backup speed is also quite fast.

[Recording time]

 

Simple, neat, and compact design

The K45 is different from other Samsung camcorders. Unlike others which were rounding types, this is dynamic style with more sharp angled edges. It might be the most typical shooting camcorder, but this has Samsung’s own design feeling. When holding a grip, I felt comfortable. The top putting 4 fingers and recording button on the right position make the recording more comfortable.

It comes with 3 colors such as midnight black, galaxy silver, and deep ocean blue. The outer material is slick type with some pearl. I only saw the black actually, but I think other 2 colors have their own dignity.

On the front of the K45, SSD is engraved in intaglio. The sharp edges and protruding zoom dial in a streamline shape looks more powerful than former Samsung models.

On the other side, there’s a leather hand grip which is size adjustable. It’s not a full angle grip convenient for low angle shot, so the grip might be not that good, but due to another recording and zoom button on the LCD, there’s no inconvenience.

Inside the body, Power, IS, LCD compensation, Display, and EasyQ buttons are located. HD output switch is also here. The Easy Q button is for beginners and sets everything by the camera itself according to the conditions. The LCD compensation button is to temporarily compensate LCD to 3 levels when the LCD is dark or difficult to see.

 

On the top, Zoom dial and Photo shot buttons are located. The Zoom dial can adjust zooming speed to 3 levels. It’s unique that the Photo button is located on the side. The K45 provides just a snap shot function for still images without half shutter. On the top of the lens, a stereo microphone is installed and built-in speaker on the right side of the microphone.

There’s an automatic lens cover on the front of the lens, and the filter part for various converting lenses is 39mm. There’s no separate flash, because this is for movie recording not still images. However, it should have been better if there was a steadily lighting lamp. The F value is F1.4-4.9, and it’s so bright in the wide angle, so it has an advantage in indoor shots.

On the back, there’s a recording button and mode change button. And inside the sliding type cover, HDMI/USB/AV output/DC power slots are located. The location of the recording button is so appropriate.

120 minutes of battery, Dual recharge with USB/AC adaptor

Battery is quite good. It’s 3.7V 4.8Wh. This can record continuous 2 hours, and actually 1.5 hours approximately. Of course, it depends on situations, but the performance of battery is great. It takes 2 hours to recharge with AC adaptor and 4 hours with USB in a PC.

There’s a battery cover on a bottom with a SDHC memory slot up to 32GB. To prevent losing the battery cover, there’s a smooth connection part, and the tripod hold is made of strong metal.

 

Great image quality with less noise

The image quality gets better than the C10 which was a SD camcorder. The image quality when connecting to a HDTV, but it was also good with the full screen of a 22” LCD monitor. When watching original files before converting, some line were found due to the interlace type.

This support 5 resolutions such as TV Super High (App. 5Mbps) : 720×480 (60i) / TV High(App. 4Mbps) : 720×480 (60i) / TV Standard(App. 3Mbps) : 720×480 (60i) / Web High (App. 4Mbps) : 640×480 (30p) / Web Standard (App. 3Mbps) : 640×480 (30p)

TV Super Fine

4 way button with great controls

The K45 has adopted a 4 way function button with great control not touch. Among 4 ways, Menu is up and Recording is down. On the LCD, there’s a separate Recording button, so when recording with a low angle, high angle, and self shot, it provides better controls. The interface of the LCD is the same as the C10. The interface is so intuitive and fast. Zooming is also possible with Up/Down,

When clicking the 4 way button, SCN, Exposure, Play, and Focus are allocated to the 4 ways, and without internal setting, various mode settings are possible from outside. This supports a lot of iScene modes for beginners such as Auto, Sport, Portrait, Spotlight, Beach, Snow, Fast movement, Food, and Waterfalls.

230K pixels 2.7” Swivel LCD

The K45 has adopted 2.7” 230K pixels of vivid LCD, it has good viewing both indoors and outdoors. It can be rotated to 90 and 270 degree, so low and high angle recording is comfortable, and it’s easy to control the recording and zoom buttons. There’s some noise inside, but the detail is great and vivid.

Convenient thumbnail function

When in the thumbnail mode, 6 video thumbnails are played. Moving a cursor to the thumbnail, the video inside the thumbnail is played. And clicking it, it becomes larger. Edit function is also provided to divide it.

 

Great AF/AF performance and mobility

It takes some time to turn it on, but it has a quick start function to finish shots in 1 sec from a shot ready mode.

Focusing speed and getting Exposure by the movement of objects are so fast. Macro is also great. High speed and high zoom function are so great, so in mobility this is so cool.

Natural Color balance

The color balance adapted to environment is so good. It has various white balances such as Auto, Sunlight, Cloud, Fluorescent light, Light bulb, and Custom. Saturation is kind of low, but the color detected in Auto is so smooth and gradation is also good.

Up-Scaled 1600×1200 Photo

Still image function is an additional function for the K45. 800×600 basic size and 1600×1200 up-scaled size can be seen by connecting to HDTV. While recording, still shots can be stored and other effects are also applied. However, we can’t expect the level of digital cameras, but this can be used to take snap shots.

Face Recognition, Backlight compensation

The K45 has the Face Recognition function. This function is getting better. With the Face Recognition function, it automatically sets the exposure of portraits and takes a shot with proper exposure when contrast between background and portraits is noticeable.

If the backlight is too strong, it might be better to use the Backlight mode or exposure compensation, not the Face Recognition. However, not in the backlight condition, the Face Recognition function is better.

Fader function - The Fader function can give fading effect to the beginning and end of the video with sound.

Effect functions

Various effects are applied such as Black and White, Sepia, Reversion, Art, Emboss, Mosaic, Mirror, Pastel, Whitish, and Step Printing. Among them, Mirror, Mosaic, and Step Printing are only for web quality. Especially, the Mirror is funny, and the Whitish will be welcomed by women users.

 C.Nite in darkness

C.Nite can take a shot in the dark place by adjusting the shutter speed. In a manual mode, the shutter has 1/60 sec of limit speed, so in the dark place, let’s use the C.Nite supporting 1/30 sec of shutter speed. Actually, F1.8 and the capacity of K45 are enough, so C.Nite will not be used much, but sometimes if there’s no light or for sleeping baby, it’s useful.

Interval Recording

The Interval Recording is to take continuous shots for a long time and play them as a video. Interval and time can be set and through the recording button, the video is recorded even after stopping for a while. This function can record some dramatic scenes such as change of scenery, movement of cloud, sunrise and sunset, flower blooming, and so on.

Intelli-Studio in the K45

Connecting the K50 to a PC by USB, the Edit and Video upload software Intelli-Studio is automatically run. Using the Intelli-Studio, edit with various effects and simple converting can be done. Even beginners can use this with easy and intuitive icons, and any manual is not needed. It’s better to install the software in your PC, because it’s faster.

 

Running the Intelli-Studio

Data are shown on the top and bottom of the Intelli-Studio screen with small thumbnails. Clicking the Play Thumbnail on the body, a video in the thumbnail begins to play. Double clicking it or pushing the Play button, you can see the video in a large window.

Uploading a video on YouTube

Through the Intelli-Studi, you can upload videos on YouTube and Flickr. It’s such a simple and convenient web uploading system. And then, checking the upload.

 

Let’s remember a day with the K45.

The Full-HD up-scaling is so amazing technology of Samsung. To be honest, I had doubted the quality of SD, but I could see the SD video was better, and the HDTV output was even better.  I’m so happy because I could see the great quality of SD videos. Even though there’s some limitation of built-in memory, 32GB SSD can keep data for a week or a month, and SD/SDHC can be regarded as a media for play. In that, it should have been better if there was a better album management system. I’m not satisfied that the remote controller is not included. However, other functions and product itself were great.

For a day life in a family, UCC, or my children, it’s a good camcorder with good quality and performance. The performance with OIS was really great as if it’s like a following model of the H106. The power of 52x zoom and Intelli 65x zoom is also outstanding. It’s so fun to use. If it’s okay for you if the quality is not HD, the K45 is the best and reasonable choice, I think.