Consumer electronics show IFA kicked off in Berlin this week with press conferences from most of the major names in technology taking place ahead of the start of the show itself on 4 September. Among those big names is Panasonic, which is hosting its own event today (2 September) to show off its new products. Here’s how to watch the Panasonic IFA 2015 live stream and what to expect from the event.
You can find out more about what’s happening in our what to expect from IFA 2015 article.
How to watch Panasonic IFA 2015 live stream
Panasonic’s press conference will begin at 3pm local time in Berlin, which is 2pm here in the UK.
You’ll be able to watch the press conference live right here on this page, so set a reminder and come back here just before it begins to watch the action as it happens.
Update: It’s past 2pm and we know that Panasonic has kicked off its conference, but so far we’ve been unable to find a live stream to share with you. We’re assuming it’s a technical error on Panasonic’s part so we’ll update this article as soon as we can with information and hopefully the rest of the live stream for you to watch.
What to expect from Panasonic at IFA 2015
Panasonic has released a ‘trailer’ of its Panasonic Live@IFA 2015 press conference, but it doesn’t reveal much at all. You can watch it at the top of this page.
However, Panasonic has previously shown off prototypes of OLED TVs, so we’re expecting to see consumer versions of those at IFA 2015. Speculation suggests that there will be an OLED TV with a 4K curved screen.
Additionally, we might also see the final version of the prototype 4K Blu-ray player unveiled at CES in January.
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At a Glance
Expert’s Rating
Our Verdict
If you’re after a quirky camera that’ll let you take snaps and print them out for your friends or family, but aren’t worried about the quality, the Kodak Smile Instant Print Digital Camera might be a good option for you. But some of the nostalgia of the instant camera is taken away by the design, the ability to choose not to print bad photos and the lack of the traditional developing film.
Best Prices Today: Kodak Smile Instant Print Digital Camera
Kodak’s Smile Instant Print Digital Camera is half instant printer , half instant camera . It can (in theory) print photos you’ve already taken using a different camera and then transferred onto a MicroSD card, but it also has a built-in camera that means you can use it to capture photos on the device itself and print those too.
This may sound great, but the downside is that we found it does neither thing particularly well. Its camera isn’t fantastic, and it’s very slow so taking photos of kids or animals is almost impossible. You are able to choose not to print bad photos, which can’t be said for all instant cameras, but those you do print are likely to suffer with strange exposure and less than great quality.
We’ve always found Zink printers like this one to be less than satisfactory when it comes to their quality. They tend to lose warmth, clarity and contrast, so you might not love the photos it produces.
The benefit of this kind of printer is that you don’t have to wait for photos to develop, but that’s also part of the appeal of your more traditional instant camera that uses film. As mentioned, you can also choose not to print bad photographs and you can edit them as we explain more about below, as well as exporting them to other devices should you wish to.
When taking photos with the Smile Instant Print Digital Camera, or after you’ve captured one, you can add a border to make the print look more like a traditional instant camera photo, or add monochrome, vintage or aqua filters. These can create some nice effects and we often preferred these edited results to a straightforward print.
There’s also a photobooth option that lets you take two photos to print side by side on one sheet, a timer, and a surprisingly effective flash should you need one.
You can store three photos within the internal memory of the device, but it’s recommended that you add a MicroSD card into the dedicated slot for more storage (up to 256GB). You should also be able to print any photos on the MicroSD card that come from other devices, but during our testing we could not get this to work. All of the photos we added to the MicroSD card, whether in a folder or not, were not recognised as data by the printer and therefore unable to print.
When it comes to the design and build of the Kodak Smile, we found it to be sturdy and compact, which is handy for popping into a bag to take out and about. It has a lanyard attachment available too. The shutter button is easily accessible and the viewing screen isn’t amazing, but does the job and is more than you’ll get from some similarly priced rivals. We found that the battery life was good, with a handy indicator at the bottom of the screen to help you avoid it running out mid print.
It’s a shame the design is more printer-like than camera-like. Some of the charm of an instant camera is taken away by the slightly clunky, boxy design. There are several fun colour options available, though, including black, pink, blue, green and yellow.
If you’re unsure about whether the Kodak Smile is right for you, you might like to check out our round-ups of the best portable printers and the best instant cameras.
Verdict
It’s really tricky to rate the Kodak Smile Instant Print Digital Camera. On the one hand, it’s a compact device that has almost every feature we could ask for in an instant camera/printer hybrid. A decent screen, a microSD card slot, a flash, good battery life, speedy printing, editing capabilities and an affordable price tag. On the other hand, the editing capabilities are limited, the microSD card slot seems to have trouble finding images not taken on the Smile itself, and the prints are low quality when they arrive.
Best Prices Today: Kodak Smile Instant Print Digital Camera
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