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Connected Objects Imaging

XY Share It squares up photos with your circle of friends

Since the dawn of the digital camera and years into the smartphones imaging revolution that launched billions of photos around the Internet, syncing up photos with friends, family and fellow party guests is a game of jumping through digital hoops using a barrage of services with different tradeoffs: Facebook, Dropbox, Google Photos, iCloud photo sharing and on and on.

XY Share It offers a twist on photo sharing that addresses the sometimes surprisingly difficulty in sharing photos with mobile devices that may be right next to you. By introducing a small Bluetooth gadget similar to the locator tags (such as the one created by the company) that have deluged crowdfunding platforms, one can easily and securely share photo with those who have the tag. Essentially, the small squareish device acts as an authentication device.

Categories
Imaging Video

One-touch Flagg’it makes editing sporting highlights less of drag

Over the last few years, sports have embraced action cameras as a way to capture those incredible moments that are often missed to later share with others. Their usually small sizes offer high-quality HD recording options, but their downside lies in having to manually turn them on and off which ultimately takes the focus off the action.

Flagg’it is a wearable button that functions as an instant marker for any and all cameras someone may have. A single button press marks a video track with a flag, and the included Flagg’it software allows users to import their video with the attached flags. Having these markers lets users more easily edit their video without having to review the entire thing for notable moments, a process that can easily eat up so much time.

Those behind Flagg’it are banking on the fact that it’s easier to begin the editing process in the moment rather than back at a computer, so they’ve made it easy to do so. The device doesn’t function through Bluetooth or Wi-Fi but rather emits an audio signal which it uses to sync instead, allowing Flagg’it to work with any camera at any distance. And its 50 hours or more of battery life relieves batteries worries, too. A Flagg’it device goes for $69, and is expected to ship July 2015 if the campaign raises $50,000.

What Flagg’it does, it does very well. Sports enthusiasts will no doubt absolutely love the ability to set up flags on their recorded video in real time, so its functionality will be met with warm welcome. It’s also shock, dust, and shock resistant, but even then it isn’t certain Flagg’it will be able to truly withstand the punishment it surely will receive.

Categories
Connected Objects

QLEEK seeks to recapture physical display for digital media

QLEEKPeople love to display their records, CDs, DVDs and other acronym-identified digital files in their apartments or houses, but not all are nice to look at. The French-made QLEEK offers a way to store digital files onto little cool looking wooden hexagons called Tapps. Different designs for each Tapp are available online to make them look however you want. Tapps present a cool decorating opportunity for those wanting to display them. To play the Tapp’s file, simply place it on the QLEEK device that connects via USB to any computer and the computer will automatically play the video, song, podcast, photo slideshow or any other kind of file the Tapp contains. For early-birds, the QLEEK device and five Tapps only costs $179 or a regular price of $249 with estimated delivery in December 2014. QLEEK is striving for a $70,000 goal in a 31-day campaign on Indiegogo.

Categories
Connected Objects Imaging

Famatic tries tapping into the senior market with a cloud-connected photo viewer

The Premise. There’s nothing that grandparents love more than photos of their grandkids. Photo sharing these days is easy with the Internet and social media, but grandparents are notorious for having trouble using these new technologies. From a distance, sharing photos with older people can be difficult.

The Product. Famatic is a digital picture frame with an added touch screen bonus. People can share photos via wi-fi directly to the frame so that grandparents can enjoy a slideshow of new material right from their living room. The 8 GB device connects to Instagram, Facebook and e-mail as well so that people sharing on these platforms can easily upload their photos or videos to Famatic. The screen shows who shared the photo or video along with the caption and allows users to comment on each photo.

The Pitch. Famatic’s pitch begins with a charming video showing a family using the product with ease. It manages to use the same infomercial format that many campaigns use, but does so in a cute way that will make you laugh. The Famatic creators express an interest in the rest of the campaign to connect their product to more social media, including Flickr and Picasa. Famatic hopes to raise $75,000 in their 42-day Kickstarter campaign.

The Perks. This-amped up digital frame from the Netherlands offers a $169 early-bird special for the U.S. which includes shipping and a $209 international early-bird special with shipping included for the EU. At its regular price, the Famatic frame costs Americans $189 and the rest of the world $229. The highest reward tier of $329 offers different color options for backers. All tiers have an estimated delivery date of October 2014.

The Potential. The glory days of the digital photo frame have faded in the wake of tablet popularity. However, cloud-connected frames have some potential. Prior to leaving the consumer imaging market, Kodak had some success with the Kodak Pulse More recently, Flink went the crowdfunding route for its cloud-connected picture viewer, but fell short in its campaign. That said, Famatic is a promising way to share photos with friends and families alike and will improve as its creators add to their product in the future.