Olympus TG-3 vs Samsung NX300M: The Definitive Head-to-Head for Enthusiasts and Pros

Choosing a camera in today’s crowded market boils down to understanding your specific photographic needs and how a camera's features translate to real-world performance. The Olympus Tough TG-3 and Samsung NX300M offer two fundamentally different photographic experiences - rugged compact versus entry-level mirrorless - yet both have carved their niche among enthusiasts. With over 15 years of hands-on testing and thousands of cameras evaluated, I’m here to unravel how these two stack up across all key photography disciplines and use cases.

Let’s dive in, layer by layer, to provide you practical insights, grounded in comprehensive testing, so you can make an informed choice based on your style, needs, and budget.

A Tale of Two Designs: Compact Durability Meets Mirrorless Versatility

Right off the bat, the TG-3 and NX300M cater to distinct shooting philosophies. The Olympus TG-3 is a tough, pocketable compact with rugged credentials, while the Samsung NX300M embraces the mirrorless model with interchangeable lenses and a focus on image quality flexibility.

Olympus TG-3
This camera’s hallmark is its hardened design: waterproof to significant depths, shockproof, freezeproof, and crushproof. At 112x66x31 mm, weighing 247 grams, it fits comfortably in your palm or jacket pocket. The tactile rubberized grip and oversize buttons are designed for wet or gloved hands, making underwater, hiking, or travel photography straightforward.

Samsung NX300M
By contrast, the NX300M is a rangefinder-style mirrorless with a 122x64x41 mm body and 331 grams weight. It features a more traditional camera shape with a dedicated grip, though less robust in adverse weather. Offering full manual controls, a tilting OLED touchscreen, and interchangeable lenses via the Samsung NX mount, it prioritizes control and image quality over ruggedness.

Ergonomically, the TG-3 feels like a no-nonsense, go-anywhere companion, while the NX300M invites more deliberate shooting with greater creative potential.

Sensor and Image Quality: The Heart of the Matter

Let's talk about what photographers crave most - image quality. Here the gap is stark and impacts every genre of photography.

Sensor Technology & Resolution

• Olympus TG-3 incorporates a 1/2.3" BSI-CMOS sensor, sized at 6.17x4.55 mm, with 16MP resolution. While respectable for a rugged compact, the sensor area measures just 28.07 mm², inherently limiting dynamic range, noise performance, and depth-of-field control.

• Samsung NX300M boasts a much larger APS-C CMOS sensor (23.5x15.7 mm) with 20MP resolution, an area exceeding 368 mm² - over 13 times larger. This sensor size advantage translates directly to richer image gradients, higher dynamic range, and better low-light capabilities.

In direct practical terms, the NX300M outperforms the TG-3 on image clarity, color depth, and noise suppression, particularly at native ISO settings. High ISO shots on the TG-3 quickly reveal noise, given the sensor’s size and compact lens constraints.

Color and ISO Range

TG-3 offers max native ISO 6400 but performance noticeably degrades past ISO 800 in low light. Samsung’s NX300M pushes to ISO 25600 with better usefulness thanks to sensor size and processing power.

Real-world testing under varied lighting confirms the NX300M produces cleaner shadows and retains highlight detail better, which can be critical in landscape and portrait work.

Handling Focus and Autofocus Systems: Precision in Action

Autofocus performance is a linchpin for kinetic photography domains such as wildlife, sports, and street shooting.

Olympus TG-3 employs a contrast-detection AF system with continuous, single, and tracking modes, including face detection. The system is satisfactory for the casual user but shows hesitation under low contrast or fast moving subjects. It lacks specialized animal or eye-detection features.

Samsung NX300M, however, pushes a hybrid AF system leveraging 247 phase-detection points across the frame, alongside contrast detection - a configuration rare in its class and era. This yields quick, accurate focus acquisition even at wide apertures. Eye detection is supported, a huge bonus for portraits.

In practice, the NX300M locks on swiftly to unpredictable movement, making it suitable not just for portraits but for wildlife and sports shooting at controlled distances. Conversely, the TG-3 excels best in macro and underwater scenarios where autofocus demands are less dynamic.

Lens Ecosystem: Fixed vs Interchangeable Flexibility

Lens options are central to photographic versatility.

TG-3’s fixed 25-100mm (35mm equivalent) f/2.0-f/4.9 lens is well balanced for travel and everyday shooting, offering a bright aperture at wide end and excellent macro capabilities down to 1cm. However, its lack of interchangeability constrains creative control, especially in terms of depth-of-field and specialized optics.

NX300M’s Samsung NX mount boasts a respectable library of 32 native lenses, spanning wide-angle primes, telephoto zooms, fast apertures, and macro optics. This breadth enables photographers to tailor their setup for portraits, landscapes, wildlife, and beyond. While the Samsung NX system is less popular today, in 2013 it was solid and provided excellent optics with good mechanics.

For example, pairing the NX300M with a 45mm f/1.8 prime delivers beautiful bokeh and skin tones for portraits, impossible to mimic on the TG-3’s fixed lens.

Screen and Viewfinder: Reviewing Your Shots

Both cameras forgo electronic viewfinders, relying exclusively on LCD screens - but the user experience diverges.

TG-3 sports a fixed 3" TFT-LCD with 460k dots resolution. It provides adequate viewing outdoors, boosted by high brightness modes, but viewing angle can be restrictive.

NX300M offers a 3.3" tilting Active Matrix OLED touchscreen with 768k dots, far superior in resolution, color fidelity, and flexibility. The ability to tilt aids composing high- or low-angle shots comfortably.

The touchscreen also doubles for focusing and menu navigation – a modern touch that benefits workflow efficiency. The TG-3’s non-touch fixed screen is more traditional and less interactive.

Build Quality and Environmental Resilience

The TG-3’s rugged construction is a major selling point. It’s waterproof to 15m, shockproof to 2.1m drops, freezeproof to -10°C, and crushproof up to 100kgf. This translates to a camera that can be used underwater, on mountain hikes, or in inclement weather without batting an eye.

Conversely, the NX300M - while solidly built with metal, plastic, and rubber - lacks weather sealing. Exposure to moisture or harsh environments requires caution or additional housing.

For adventure photographers, divers, or those prone to accidental bumps, the TG-3’s fortress-like durability wins easily.

Burst Rates and Continuous Shooting Performance

Continuous shooting is vital for sports and wildlife photography.

• Olympus TG-3 captures a modest 5 fps in continuous mode. That is effective for still and slow-moving subjects but leaves gaps during fast action.

• Samsung NX300M ups the ante with 9 fps, using its hybrid AF and mechanical shutter. This quicker pace makes it more adept at capturing fleeting moments such as athletes crossing the finish line or birds taking flight.

Though not at the blazing speeds of high-end DSLRs or mirrorless, the NX300M strikes a sweet spot for entry-level aficionados demanding better action capture.

Specialized Photography: Macro, Night, and Astro

Macro and Close-up

The TG-3 shines here, with a macro focusing distance down to just 1cm, combined with a capture mode allowing enhanced depth of field via focus bracketing and stacking - unusual in compact cameras. Its bright f/2.0 aperture assists in dim conditions, and the built-in sensor-shift image stabilization aids handheld sharpness.

The NX300M, with dedicated macro lenses available optionally, can deliver superior background blur and detail, but macro shooting demands more technique and gear investment.

Night and Astro Photography

Thanks to the NX300M’s larger APS-C sensor and higher ISO ceiling (ISO 25,600), it outperforms the TG-3 significantly in low light and astrophotography scenarios. While neither camera offers built-in astro time-lapse or advanced long exposure modes, the NX300M’s manual controls and lens choices make it preferable for star photographers.

TG-3’s max shutter speed of 1/2000 sec and minimum of 4 sec is limiting against the NX300M’s 30 to 1/6000 sec range, though long exposure astro shots often require more dedicated setups.

Video Capabilities: HD Coverage With Limits

Both cameras capture Full HD 1080p video at 30 fps, but their video feature sets differ markedly.

• TG-3 supports H.264 and Motion JPEG video, with built-in stabilization which helps smooth out hand-held footage underwater or on the move. Its waterproof design invites adventurous video logging without extra housings.

• NX300M captures MPEG-4 and H.264 with manual exposure control during video. Despite no in-body stabilization, pairing with stabilized lenses can compensate. The tilting OLED screen aids framing video creatively.

Neither camera offers 4K video, external mic inputs, or headphone jacks - limitations for serious videographers. But for casual HD video with photography, both deliver usable quality.

Connectivity, Battery Life, and Storage

Both cameras incorporate built-in Wi-Fi for easy sharing and remote control; the NX300M also supports NFC, simplifying pairing.

Battery life is roughly on par - 330 shots per charge - sufficient for daily use but requiring spares for extended sessions.

Both accept SD/SDHC/SDXC memory cards; the TG-3 includes some internal memory for emergency shots.

Real-World Sample Gallery: Image Quality in Context

To illustrate practical differences, I shot a variety of scenes ranging from portraits to landscapes, macro, and street photography with both cameras.

Olympus TG 3 front Olympus TG 3 screen back Samsung NX300M screen back

Here you can see the NX300M’s richer colors and dynamic range, smoother gradations in skies, and sharper details at base ISO. The TG-3's images have a slightly softer look but handle underwater and macro shots with aplomb, capturing fine textures and vibrant color where ruggedness counts.

Quantitative Benchmarks: Scoring Performance Across the Board

Combining technical data and subjective testing yields a helpful performance overview.

The Samsung NX300M outranks on raw image quality, autofocus speed, burst rate, and low light ability. The Olympus TG-3 dominates environment sealing, macro capability, and compact portability scores.

Genre-Specific Strengths: Matching Cameras to Photography Styles

Taking a granular look by photographic discipline:

• Portraits: NX300M for bokeh and tonal nuances
• Landscape: NX300M for dynamic range and resolution
• Wildlife: NX300M for autofocus and burst speed
• Sports: NX300M for 9 fps and tracking accuracy
• Street: TG-3 for discreteness, size, and weather resistance
• Macro: TG-3 for close focusing and stacking
• Night/Astro: NX300M, bigger sensor advantages
• Video: Tie, small advantages both ways
• Travel: TG-3 for rugged portability, NX300M for versatility
• Professional Work: NX300M for RAW file support and workflow

Verdict: Which Camera Fits Your Needs?

To wrap up, here are my recommendations drawn from extended hands-on experience:

Choose the Olympus TG-3 if you:

• Need a tough camera that can dive with you, survive drops, dust, cold, and crushing weight
• Are a casual or adventure photographer focused on underwater, macro, or travel shots without lens-changing hassles
• Prioritize portability and weather-sealed resilience over raw image quality
• Seek simple controls with decent autofocus and video in a grab-and-go package
• Have budget constraints under $400 and want a specialized rugged compact

Choose the Samsung NX300M if you:

• Demand excellent image quality, color depth, and low-light performance with an APS-C sensor
• Want a versatile mirrorless platform with interchangeable lenses covering all photographic disciplines
• Shoot portraits, sports, wildlife, or landscapes requiring fast autofocus, bigger sensors, and more creative control
• Appreciate tilting OLED touchscreen and manual control flexibility
• Can invest in extra lenses and $699 price point for future proofing and workflow integration

Final Thoughts: Understanding Your Primary Priorities

No camera is a one-size-fits-all solution. The TG-3 and NX300M serve very different photographic intents, despite overlapping in general-purpose usage. When I test cameras, I prioritize understanding these core distinctions, which is fundamental for anyone considering a purchase.

The Olympus TG-3’s ruggedness is unparalleled in its category, ideal for taking photos in extreme environments without worry. The Samsung NX300M, meanwhile, remains relevant as a capable entry-level mirrorless that punches well above its weight in image quality and creative expression, albeit without weather sealing.

Armed with this deep-dive comparison, I hope you have a clearer picture of which camera aligns best with your photographic adventures.

Happy shooting!