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Engadget's recession antidote: win a Joby Gorillapod SLR!
This whole global economic crisis, and its resulting massive loss of jobs got us thinking. We here at Engadget didn't want to stand helplessly by, announcing every new round of misery without giving anything back -- so we decided to take the opportunity to spread a little positivity. We'll be handing out a new gadget every day (except for weekends) to lucky readers until we run out of stuff or companies stop sending things. Today we've got a Joby Gorillapod SLR on offer, perfect for keeping your shiny new (or old, whatever) DSLR steady even in awkward situations. Read the rules below (no skimming -- we're omniscient and can tell when you've skimmed) and get commenting! Hooray for free stuff!Major thanks to Joby for providing the gear!The rules: Leave a comment below. Any comment will do, but if you want to share your proposal for "fixing" the world economy, that'd be sweet too. You may only enter this specific giveaway once. If you enter this giveaway more than once you'll be automatically disqualified, etc. (Yes, we have robots that thoroughly check to ensure fairness.) If you enter more than once, only activate one comment. This is pretty self explanatory. Just be careful and you'll be fine. Contest is open to anyone in the 50 States, 18 or older! Sorry, we don't make this rule (we hate excluding anyone), so be mad at our lawyers and contest laws if you have to be mad. Winner will be chosen randomly. The winner will receive one (1) Joby Gorillapod SLR. Approximate retail value is $44.95. If you are chosen, you will be notified by email. Winners must respond within three days of the end of the contest. If you do not respond within that period, another winner will be chosen. Entries can be submitted until Friday, July 10th, at 11:59PM ET. Good luck! Full rules can be found here.
Found Footage: Inexpensive do-it-yourself tripod mount for iPhone
iPhone Savior featured this short video clip this morning by Scott Patrick showing how to use an inexpensive Contour iPhone case and some common hardware to make an iPhone tripod mount. There are two impressive points about this mount; first, by using the Contour case, you know that the iPhone is going to be held securely (my wife used one for over a year and never had it inadvertently open up), and second, Scott made it so it will work with any standard tripod camera mount head. With the tripod Scott is using, it would be simple to flip the camera 90° to put it into a landscape configuration. This should work well for both still photography with any iPhone or video work with the iPhone 3GS.[Thanks to TUAW reader Michael for pointing us to this video]
STriDER: Virginia Tech's creepy, three-legged bot
Apparently, robot designers are worried that they're not creating automatons that are creepy enough, because a team of engineers at Virgina Tech have put something together that will give even the toughest of men chills. The robot in question is the three-legged STriDER (Self-excited Tripedal Dynamic Experimental Robot, not to be confused with CMU's Strider) which balances itself on two legs and then flips its body 180-degrees, bringing its third leg forward with the motion. According to project leader Dennis Hong, "STriDER's gait is closer to that of a human walking than most bipedal humanoid robots you see today," adding, "This is how we humans walk, we do not actively control our knees, we just let them swing." It does seem to be true, as the robot has an eerily life-like quality to its movements. Don't believe us? Take a look at the video after the break and see the tripod in action.
