Verizon Wireless said on Tuesday that starting December 13, the company will offer the world's first 4G LTE camera, the Samsung Galaxy Camera. Packed with Google's Android 4.1 "Jelly Bean" OS, owners will be able to shoot, edit and share high quality images and video wherever there's a Verizon 4G LTE connection.
"Social media enthusiasts will be able to connect to their accounts through their camera and upload pictures and videos of outings, concerts and parties as they happen," said Verizon's Albert Aydin. "Shutterbugs and bloggers who post images on their sites will be able to upload photos over 4G LTE instead of waiting to use their computers at home."
Featuring a 4.8-inch HD Super Clear LCD touch screen, the new Android-based Samsung Galaxy Camera sports a 16MP lens, 21x optical zoom lens and optical image stabilization for clearer pictures even while moving. It will also have full access to Google Play so that users can download and install Android apps like Instagram.
According to the list of specs, the new camera has the hardware of a high-end Android phone, only with a huge lens mounted on the back. The camera's SoC of choice is a quad-core Samsung Exynos 4412 clocked at 1.4 GHz which features a Mali-400MP GPU. Other camera specs include 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of internal storage, and a microSD card slot supporting up to 64 GB of extra storage.
If that isn't enough to make this camera more phone-like than any other on the market, it also has an accelerometer, a gyro, a compass, GPS and Corning Gorilla Glass 2 protecting the touchscreen. Connectivity includes 802.11 a/b/g/n dual-band wireless (meaning both 5 GHz and 2.4 GHz), Wi-Fi hotspot support, and Bluetooth v4.0. The only thing this camera can't do, it seems, is actually place a call.
The Galaxy Camera will be available for $549.99 on Thursday and offered in two colors, Cobalt Black, exclusive to Verizon Wireless, and White. Users will be able to add the Samsung Galaxy Camera to their Share Everything account for the promotional price of $5 per month, the company said.
