Category: Imaging

Categories
Imaging Smart Home

Back to the Backers: Butterfleye never tires of watching without wires

There’s been an explosion of home security cameras in the past few years, but whether they are attached to some kind of monitoring service or rely on their own apps, they are less convenient to install than they could be. While many of them happily hop on to a Wi-Fi network, they can’t stray too far from an outlet.

Butterfleye combines a wide-angle lens with a big battery to keep it going up to a week without charging. It employs sophisticated sensors that go beyond simple motion detection to include sound detection; it can also differentiate between humans and pets. The company claims it has more improvements in the queue in terms of accurate identification that it plans to deliver via regular firmware updates. Going along with the prevailing model these days, the company offers some limited cloud storage of video the Butterfleye captures with more available for a monthly fee.

Continue reading “Back to the Backers: Butterfleye never tires of watching without wires”
Categories
Imaging

Photokite Phi is a drone that’s kept on a tight leash

Lots of people are excited about the potential of drones for package delivery ad other lofty tasks, but today one of the key applications is fancy camera work. Don’t be fooled. It takes a lot of work and expertise to make an autonomously one-shot music video masterpiece.

Indeed, the hardest part of drones is not getting them in the air but controlling them. That’s the inspiration for the Photokite Phi, an action cam-carrying drone that is meant to be tethered. In effect, it is something of a flying selfie stick. This doesn’t mean, though, that the Phi doesn’t have its charms. For one, like a folded kite, it’s relatively portable, folding into a cylindrical case. Its soft propellers minimize the potential danger from even the tethered ride going awry and its leash winds into the body of the device. It can also be controlled via wrist gestures.

Continue reading “Photokite Phi is a drone that’s kept on a tight leash”
Categories
Fishing Imaging

GoFish Cam captures undersea exploits with sharks and trout

Fishing is one of the few sports where the person participating in it can’t even see most of what’s happening right before and during the most crucial part of the action.

patent-claimedGoFish Cam is a patent-pending underwater action camera that was designed to solve that issue. The wireless, 1080p HD color video camera gets attached to the user’s fishing line and captures the action in conjunction with an app for Android and iOS mobile devices. If the line snaps, the camera was designed to slowly float to the top of the water because it has almost neutral buoyancy underwater,. The camera is also equipped with infrared lights for night vision, a 170-degree wide-angle lens and built-in microphone. GoFish Cam will ship in February 2016 at $169.99, but early Kickstarter backers can buy one at reduced pricing that starts at $115. Its makers set a Kickstarter goal of raising $55,000 by Sept. 1.

Fishermen have ever been shy about sharing their big catches That could drive significant interest for GoFish Cam for those who don’t want to jury rig their own solution. But capturing underwater video can require a fair amount of light, which could make it challenging for those adventures to compete with pristine GoPro video.

Categories
Connected Objects Imaging

Tiny Graava action cam decides which scenes make the cut

With the formidable quality of video that can be captured by smartphones, there’s got to be something special offered by a camcorder to arouse interest. GoPro figured out that small size, ruggedness, a wide angle. It’s attracted a number of competitors, including Contour, Drift Innovation, Sony, C&A Marketing (using the Polaroid Cube brand) and, more recently, TomTom (yes, the GPS company) with a 4K camera called the Bandit.

Graava enters this crowded field with a small, polished gemstone-like camcorder that affixed to a range of bikes and apparel with the right mounts. Lacking an LCD as many of these products do, it has a grid of LEDs on its side that indicate the product’s status, and has an enclosed HDMI connector and microSD slot for expansion It can also be charged wirelessly using the Qi standard. What sets Graava apart is that it has the ability to analyze the video it captures and pick out the most interesting parts depending on how long the resulting video is. And when it’s not capturing extreme surfing, it can be used to capture the gentle sounds of a napping infant as a baby monitor.

Continue reading “Tiny Graava action cam decides which scenes make the cut”
Categories
Cell Phone Accessories Imaging

Lumenati CS1 transforms iPhone’s form factor into that of a Super 8 camera

A growing number of smartphone enclosures are being introduced via crowdfunding sites that promise to improve the photo capabilities of the phones’ cameras.

patent-claimedThe Lumenati CS1 follows the recent IndieVice and olloclip Studio. But the CS1 offers a unique twist, mimicking the form factor of an old Super 8 camera. Users can opt to filter video taken with the camera like an old Super 8 movie or shoot in HD with the aid of optical quality lenses. The device also lets users add filters after they shoot and change them on the fly.

Continue reading “Lumenati CS1 transforms iPhone’s form factor into that of a Super 8 camera”
Categories
Imaging

E1 camera blends a 4K GoPro with interchangeable lenses

GoPros and other small cameras have become commonplace for allowing the capture of different perspectives. They’re rugged enough to brave the elements but have a fixed lens that make many shots look similar.

The E1 trades the GoPro’s ruggedness for some of the flexibility and quality of DSLR cameras. Instead of the fixed lens used by GoPro, it can take advantage of the lenses used by “micro four thirds” (MFT) cameras such as those from Olympus and Panasonic. Instead of using the the same fisheye effect to capture everything, MFT lenses can handle long telephoto zooms and wide-angle shots. The MFT system comes close to the quality of full-fledged DSLRs, but the lenses are quite a bit smaller. Even so, the combination can get a bit unwieldy for long zoom lenses.

Continue reading “E1 camera blends a 4K GoPro with interchangeable lenses”
Categories
Cell Phone Accessories Imaging

IndieVice overcomes smartphone cameras’ vices to provide improved photos

Smartphones continue to be the de facto camera for most people. But the photos taken with them still tend to lack the artistry of higher-end cameras, even with the vastly improved cameras that are featured on the best new smartphones.

patent-claimedIndieVice is an attachment that promises to transform the cameras on any smartphone into a pro-grade camera for taking still images and video. It will also work with a GoPro camera, but requires an adapter kit. IndieVice uses Bluetooth to allow (digital) zoom in/out with the touch of a button. It was also designed so users can easily add on virtually any additional camera equipment, including lighting devices and tripods.

The IndieVice Pro model has an adaptable universal lens adapter that allows users to change professional lenses quickly. The Pro model will cost about $171 with a Bluetooth remote and ships in March 2016. Its maker has set a Kickstarter goal of raising $40,853 by July 29.

Continue reading “IndieVice overcomes smartphone cameras’ vices to provide improved photos”
Categories
Imaging

4K Sphericam 2 invites creators to have a ball capturing VR

The recent explosion of interest in virtual reality poses a problem that’s long been associated with new media: a dearth of content.The original Sphericam 360-degree video camera sought to answer that call a few years ag. It received more than three times its Kickstarter funding goal in 2012, raising more than $34,000.

Sphericam 2 is an enhanced, 4K version of the spherical video camera that also taps into growing interest in the VR device market. Its six image sensors and lenses can shoot video of anything surrounding the user. That video gets automatically stitched together and can be viewed on VR headsets including the Oculus Rift and Google Cardboard, as well as tablets or smartphones.

Sphericam 2 can also take still photos with resolution of about 4100 x 2150. It will ship with a protective carrying case at $1,499 in December. Its maker set a more ambitious Kickstarter goal of raising $150,000 by July 30 this time around.

The Sperhicam 2 is clearly a tool for pros or amateurs with generous budgets, but the potential market for it will probably get much larger as more VR headsets reach the consumer market. Some customers may also be reluctant to buy a device, for now, whose image quality is hard to fully appreciate from an online campaign video.

Categories
Cell Phone Accessories Imaging

olloclip Studio case creates a photo accessory rig for your iPhone

How far can one take smartphone imaging? Each of the many accessories that are available to improve the standard output of their integrated cameras compromises their portability either with more stuff to manage or by making for an awkward group of phone appendages that must often be treated gingerly.

olloclip is familiar with this scenario. The company that created a Kickstarter stir in 2013 with a series of smartphone lenses. It has since come out with a new version for the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus that includes a small holster to encourage taking the accessories along. Paving the way for much more than lens add-ons, though, the olloclip Studio “mobile photography system” begins with the rare protective case that can accommodate the olloclip lenses and a grip for steading the iPhone.

Continue reading “olloclip Studio case creates a photo accessory rig for your iPhone”
Categories
Connected Objects Imaging

Oko tries to reverse the digital picture frame no-go

The digital picture frame category was once hugely popular, but has sunk into a funk in recent years as photo sharing has gone mobile.

The makers of Oko are hoping to drum up renewed interest in the category by offering new features and focusing on social network interactivity. For example, Oko will let users follow hashtags and enable the device to display the best pictures and videos that are uploaded on social media networks. Features planned for the near future include voice control and, in a future version of Oko, cloud storage.

Continue reading “Oko tries to reverse the digital picture frame no-go”