Kodak Playsport Rugged Pocket Cam: 1080p Under the Sea [Pocket Cameras]

The Zi8 is one of the best pocket camcorders around, but maybe the biggest. The Playsport takes the Zi8's guts—including its 1080p video, 5MP still photo sensor—and crams them into a small, waterproof shell. And? It's cheaper.
Like the Zi8, the Playsport shoots 1080p video at 30fps, as well as 720p at 30 or 60fps. Video is stabilized—which works fairly well to reduce image shimmering in the Zi8—and displayed on a 2.0-inch LCD. Storage comes by way of SDHC, while power draws from a rechargable Li-Ion battery. Basically, it is the Zi8, except it's noticeably more compact, and it'll shoot video up to 10 feet underwater.
It's one of the first seriously rugged pocket cams on the market, but it won't be the last—as cellphone cameras and regular point-and-shoots start to take better video, dedicated pocket cams will have to do something special to justify their existence. Hence, the swimming. The Playsport will go on sale in April, for $150.

KODAK PLAYSPORT Video Camera Features:
• Waterproof up to 10 ft. (3 m)
• Full 1080p HD video capture at 30 fps
• Electronic image stabilization
• Brilliant 2.0' color LCD display
• Capture 5 MP HD stills (16:9)
• Edit and upload to the Web with built-in software and included USB cable
• Smart face tracking technology
• Incredible low-light performance
• Expandable SD/SDHC Card slot for memory cards up to 32 GB, that can record up to 10 hours of HD video**
• Li-Ion rechargeable battery with in-camera charging
• HDMI cable output (HDMI cable included)
• Remote control compatible (remote control sold separately)
• MAC and PC compatible
The KODAK PLAYSPORT Video Camera will be available in Abyss (black), Wave Crash (blue) and Adrenaline Rush (purple) for US $149.95 MSRP beginning in April 2010 at major retailers including Best Buy and Amazon.com, as well as Kodak.com. The KODAK PLAYSPORT Video Camera is also now available for pre-orders on Amazon.com.
*Colors and availability may vary by region
Product Accessories
A range of accessories are available for the KODAK PLAYSPORT Video Camera, including:
• KODAK SDHC Memory Cards, available in 4, 8 and 16 GB customized for optimal video capture
• KODAK Adventure Mount for helmet, handlebars and more
• KODAK Flexi-Tripods
• KODAK Cases, Camera Bags and Neck Straps
• Remote control
• KODAK Li-Ion Rechargeable Digital Camera Battery KLIC-7004
• Battery charger options including KODAK Li-Ion Universal Battery Charger K7600-C, KODAK Solar Charger KS100-C+2, KODAK Portable Charger KP100-C+2

 [Gizmodo via Kodak]

New cameraphone sensor to take terrible, terrible 1080p video

I’m sure this is a very grand advance in miniaturization, but I’m afraid the results may be questionable. Omnivision has announced a new sensor for mobile phone cameras that will take 14MP photos and do 1080p video at 60FPS. As far as I’m concerned, this is bad news. Cameraphone lenses are slow and of very low quality, and the tiny sensor size means both bad low light performance and bad clarity due to insanely small pixel pitch.


And the video will have to be low bitrate to accommodate the lack of storage on most phones. 1080p video at 1Mbps? It’ll be like watching an HDTV smeared with vaseline.

[CrunchGear]

8-bit CPU with 4KB of RAM apes iPhone interface

Watching this video, it doesn’t seem very much more than a demo for a rather anonymous-looking little touchscreen device, a PMP prototype maybe. Then you find out that the whole thing is running an 8-bit processor with 4KB of RAM. Touchscreen tricks like scrolling momentum are implemented perfectly well, and there appears to be little or no lag. Pac-Man runs at 60fps, which is more than I can say for the version on my G1.
The touchscreen is salvaged from an off-brand PMP, and the CPU is a 12Mhz Atmega644 — not something I’m familiar with, but I trust the author when he says it’s about 3% of the speed of an iPhone. And it’ll render a polyhedron (though I doubt it can texture it).
The question this brings up for me is why aren’t all interfaces so snappy at this point? I understand there’s more going on under the hood in a smartphone than in a demo application like this thing, but seriously, I’m going to have lag when I hit the home button on a CPU faster than the one I had in my PC a few years ago? Make it better.
[CrunchGear via MAKE]

Sanyo’s new camcorders are iFrame-compatible, and I say again, DO NOT WANT iFrame

Yesterday I lamented Apple’s decision to establish its own video standard, which, while little more than a suggested resolution and bitrate, does not fit will with any devices anywhere. The steady progression of VGA or WVGA, 720p, and 1080p are perfectly fine for the moment. That’s why every camera in the world shoots to one of them. 1080p is too much for most people to work with, but 720p isn’t that bad (though render times can be long), and VGA is really not that bad at all (Doug swears by it). So why the hell put a new one in there between WVGA and 720p? I don’t like the idea of Apple bullying companies like Sanyo, who make perfectly good camcorders already, to add an option which needlessly complicates things.
But let’s just get these camcorders out of the way, because they’re worth taking a look at. The two cameras are almost the same spec-wise except the horizontally-oriented FH1 has a 3-inch LCD as opposed to the pistol grip HD2000’s 2.7-inch. They appear to be quite versatile camcorders, able to take 12 stills a second or shoot up to 600FPS video at reduced resolution, something which was until recently the exclusive ability of Casio Exilims. They’ll shoot 1080p video at 60FPS, which is pretty amazing, though I don’t recommend you do it. Interestingly, they won’t shoot 720p or 640×480 at 60FPS — a bit odd. SD cards are the medium you record to, and both cameras have a 10x optical zoom. Quite a neat little package for $500! Or $600 if you want the pistol grip.
But to return to the rant. These cameras will also shoot, and in fact will default to, the 960×540 iFrame format. Come on. It can do so much and you’re defaulting it to this random format?
[CrunchGear]