Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom first official pictures

The Samsung Galaxy S4 Zoom is here! Check out the official pictures, and see how it looks like a phone on one side and a camera on the other.

The S4 Zoom is a camera-focused spin-off of the smash hit Samsung Galaxy S4, starting with the Android smart phone and adding a whacking great optical zoom lens on the front.

A 10x optical zoom lens, no less. The zoom lens adds some bulk to the S4 Zoom, but it's still more phone-sized than Samsung's first Android snapper, the Samsung Galaxy Camera.

The S4 Zoom is a 16-megapixel snapper with optical image stabilisation and a xenon Flash, with a 4.3-inch screen and Android 4.2 Jelly Bean software. It packs a dual-core 1.5GHz processor and connects to the Internet via 4G, which is handy when you're sending big files -- like photos, for example.

It seems Samsung has put a bit of thought into the Zoom, rather than just bolting on a giant lens. The lens ring adds a selection of controls for the camera, even if you're using it as a phone: for instance, if you're in the middle of a phone call and you see something you want to share, you can take a picture and send it to the person on the other end of the line with a twist of the zoom ring.

The zoom ring also calls up shortcuts to different camera modes.

The S4 Zoom has 8GB of memory, of which Samsung says 5GB is available for your snaps and apps, movies and music. If that's not enough leg room, whack in a microSD card for up to 64GB storage.

The S4 Zoom is coming to the UK in summer. Price is yet to be confirmed.

What do you think of the S4 Zoom? Is this the future of cameras or a weird freak of a phone? Tell me your thoughts in the comments or zoom on over to our highly-focused Facebook page.