With advances in cell phone cameras putting increasing pressure...

With advances in cell phone cameras putting increasing pressure on standalone camera manufacturers to bring out compelling features at affordable price points, Samsung announced Wednesday at a new product launch in Manhattan two feature-packed $279 point-and-shoot models and an NX family compact system camera. “People see cell phones as a threat to the digital camera business,” Reid Sullivan, senior vice president of Samsung’s digital imaging business, told Consumer Electronics Daily. Representing a brand that has toes in both waters, Sullivan said camera phones have expanded consumers’ interest in taking pictures, and Samsung’s camera division sees the interest generated by cell phone cameras “as an opportunity” rather than a threat. The $279 MV800 camera is an ultra-compact point-and-shoot model with a flip-out 3-inch LCD viewfinder that adjusts to varying angles to facilitate high and low shots, said Tim Baxter, president of Samsung America. The 16-megapixel camera has a 5x optical zoom lens and 26mm wide-angle lens, he said. The camera has an app for 3D stills and a panorama function that can use different images to stitch together a shot, he said. The $279 12-megapixel WB750 point-and-shoot camera touts an 18x optical zoom lens and can capture stills at 10 frames per second in high-speed mode, Sullivan said. The camera can also capture Full HD video while recording 10-megapixel stills simultaneously, he said. The Action Panorama feature tracks a moving person or object with a static background to record movement within a single, still photo, the company said. The 20-megapixel NX200 compact camera system comes with an 18-55mm lens and is supported by nine NX lenses from Samsung, including four shipping this fall. Users can have direct control of ISO -- which ranges from 100-12800 -- from the viewfinder so they don’t have to take their eyes off the subject, Sullivan said. Suggested retail price is $900, he said. The NX200 takes Full HD video at 30 frames per second with the H.264 codec and has a 3.0 VGA AMOLED screen, the company said. Shipping for all three cameras begins later this month, the company said.