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Canon’s cute-but-tough Ivy Rec camera hits stores later this month
After a jaunt through the crowdfunding circuit earlier in the year, Canon's clip-on Ivy Rec camera is making its way to retailers. Starting later this month, you'll be able to buy the cute camera for $129.99 in four different colors: blue, green, pink and black. And while it won't win any spec sheet comparisons with its 13-megapixel sensor, what it will do is survive tumbles and the occasional swim. According to the Canon, the body is IP68-certified water-resistant, meaning it can stay submerged at a depth of 6.6 feet for approximately 30 minutes. It's also shockproof when dropped from as high as 6.6 feet.
Canon is crowdfunding a tiny, rugged clip-on camera
Canon may be late to the clippable camera party, but it's still convinced it can bring something new to the table. The company is preparing a crowdfunding campaign for the Ivy Rec, a clip-on rugged camera that's designed to capture your hikes and other outdoor adventures. The cute-looking device won't win the image quality wars with a 13-megapixel sensor and 1080p 60FPS recording. However, it's built around a tiny water- and shock-resistant design that should be safer to use than your phone in the woods or at the beach.
Olloclip 4-in-1 iPhone lens gives you a new perspective on the world
If you're an iPhone owner, there's a good chance you take a lot of photos with your phone. That's totally understandable, given that Apple's recent smartphone offerings are widely considered to be fantastic for photography. Still, the built-in lens on your iPhone 4, 4s, 5 or 5s is still hampered by its physical limitations. The Olloclip external lens system is a clip-on accessory that offers four different view options that can seriously change the look and feel of your iPhone photos. Specs Lenses: 10X Macro, 15X Macro, Wide-angle, Fisheye Price: US$69.99 Design The Olloclip is tiny, and can easily fit in your pocket or bag with no trouble. That's a pretty crucial aspect of the accessory, especially since you're not going to want to have it equipped as you go about your day-to-day tasks. The clip portion of the device is plastic while the lenses themselves are made of metal (and glass, obviously). The clip feels snug when applied to the iPhone, and while it's not difficult to slide off when you're done, there's also little chance that it would fall off on its own. Because of how the accessory is designed, two of the lenses are placed on each side, and the metal lens casings -- which house the fisheye and wide-angle lenses -- unscrew from the plastic clip to reveal a macro lens on either side. If you read our previous review of the original Olloclip 3-in-1 lens -- which featured 10X macro, wide-angle and fisheye lenses -- this version is essentially an updated version of that, and also includes a 15X macro option. Functionality Once the Olloclip is applied to your phone, taking photos is as simple as it's ever been. There's no tweaking or adjustments needed, and switching from one lens to another takes only a few seconds. The autofocus and other built-in iPhone features work as they always have, so you can shoot burst photos, play around with various filters or shoot slow-mo video without issue. If you know how to shoot a photo with your iPhone now, you'll know how to do it with the Olloclip; it's as simple as that. As a package, the Olloclip's lenses are a great combo, but some are definitely a bit more useful than others. The fisheye lens, for example, is fun for goofy shots, but it's not something you'll use daily. Between the two macro lenses, the 15X option is definitely going to be your go-to, simply because if you're looking for macro functionality, the more the better. The wide-angle lens will get the most use from aspiring iPhone photogs, and it's worth the price of admission all on its own. It's great for outdoor shots as well as large group photos where you need to cram as many people into the frame as possible. Conclusion The Olloclip 4-in-1 is a fantastic accessory that is both easy to use and a whole lot of fun to play around with. The lenses included are great for shooting types of photos you've never had the chance to before, and if you're tired of your Facebook photo albums or Flickr collection is looking a little dull, this is one of the easiest ways to spice it up. Rating
Ben Heck builds Arduino-based automatic sunglasses, beats David Caruso to the punch (video)
CSI: Miami might be out of production, but that doesn't mean we'll be deprived of casual eyewear flipping. Not if Ben Heck has a say in the matter, at least. His latest DIY project automatically swings a pair of clip-on sunglasses into view whenever it's too sunny outside: a photocell attached to an AT Tiny microcontroller checks the light levels and, through an Arduino-based AVR MKII language, tells a rotor to spin the glasses into place. No one will be labeled a fashionista with the requisite battery pack strapped to their heads, but the construction doesn't require CNC milling and won't destroy a favorite frame. We're only disappointed that the sunglasses won't play The Who on command... yet.
The coolest thing I saw at IFA: LG's passive clip-on 3D glasses
Berlin's Internationalen Funkausstellung is by no means an unexciting consumer electronics show. Sure, there aren't nearly as many new gadgets to play with as you'll find at even the tamest year of CES, but there's still plenty else around to leave almost any tech buff feeling full. Still, this year's most exciting gadget -- to me, at least -- wasn't a new tablet, or cell phone, or even that Android-controlled robotic vacuum. No, the highlight of my week was these clip-on 3D glasses, which LG reps handed out to every interested spectator as they entered the company's booth. These dead-simple, yet completely life-changing specs were almost certainly overlooked by the 20/20 vision-abled, but for folks like me who can't stand sliding one pair of glasses over another just to watch Kung Fu Panda in three dimensions, those clip-ons you see above are the absolute best swag I could ever hope to find. There's really not much to them. The 3D experience was identical to what you'll get with traditional passive glasses -- these simply clip on top of your eyeglasses, rather than resting on their own. They also offer UV protection, and "communicate seamlessly with the TV." Well alright then. While attendees could get their own pair for free at IFA, you can also find these online for about 20 bucks -- sold as the LG AG-F220. I'd like to see them become much more widely available, and more affordable as well. So listen up, Hollywood: if you ever again want me to hand over five extra bucks at the box office to watch an animated bear kick his furry paw directly toward my temple, these better be waiting on the other side of the ticket scan.
Sony outs CLM-V55 video monitor for interchangeable lens cameras
To take John McEnroe's famous quote badly out of context, you cannot be serious about video recording without giving your devices a nice big display for videographers to monitor their recordings through. Sony's clearly in agreement and has today revealed the CLM-V55, a 5-inch clip-on unit for its interchangeable lens cameras, that provides WVGA resolution, tilt / swivel adjustments, and color peaking plus pixel magnification to make sure focus is just how you like it. The primary beneficiaries of this would be those delightful A33 and A55 siblings, which strive to combine the fast autofocus of a camcorder with the image quality of a DSLR, along with the NEX-VG10, an all-out camcorder that can nonetheless exchange its lenses and even exploit Alpha-mount glass via an adapter. You can see it outfitted with the V55 after the break, right next to the full press release. Launch is expected in March at an as yet unannounced price.
Fujitsu Siemens' Amilo Mini caught with interchangeable lids
IFA's coming up soon, and that means Fujitsu Siemens will officially unveil the Amilo Mini. Yeah, you've already heard about some preliminary specifications and witnessed the unit itself on video, but did you know about the interchangeable lids? In a ploy a siphon away even more cash from netbook buyers, the firm is very, very intelligently looking to offer at least a couple of accessories to distinguish your unit from everyone else's. It makes sense, really -- cute little notebooks deserve cute little trinkets to jazz them up. Pure brilliance, we say. See the lids on video after the break.
