Hasta La Gadget!

Sony makes floating-head telepresence avatars a reality, Sean Connery digs out gun and red speedos originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 May 2011 07:39:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Robots.net  |  New Scientist  | Email this | Comments

Tilt-shift on the cheap from NeinGrenze

The march of the plastic, retro-tastic crappy-cams continues with the frankly pretty cool-looking NeinGrenze. In keeping with the genre, this camera will add a novelty tweak to any image you take, moving away from the perfect sharpness of the digital SLR and closer to the analog surprises of film.

In this case, the gimmick is tilt-shift, the effect that makes full-sized scenes seem miniature. The proper way to do this is to use the “tilt” part of a shifting architectural lens to change the plane of focus. This keeps a very narrow strip of the picture sharp. And because our brains are uses to seeing such shallow sharpness only when our eyes get very close to something, they interpret these photos as pictures of tiny people, cars and buildings.

You can also get the effect in software, but it never really works.

The NeinGrenze (“No Limit”) 5000T is a digicam with a tilting lens built-in. With it, you can take 5MP snaps or 640 x 480 AVI video through a real, albeit cheap, tilting lens. Not only is the effect far more likely to look real, you get the grungy look you’d expect from such a plasticky marvel. You can also add in-camera filters: vivid, sepia and monochrome join the normal mode.

Power comes from a li-ion battery, focus is fixed and if you want to zoom, you’ll need to do some walking.

For $150, you could just buy a “proper” digicam and gussy up those pictures later, but where’s the fun in that? Available in Japan and Taiwan.

NeinGrenze product page [(Warning: Flash) NeinGrenze via Oh Gizmo!]

See Also:

• Plungercam: DIY Tilt-Shift Lens
• Lensbaby Tilt Transformer Marries Nikon Lenses to Micro Four …
• Lomo-fy Your iPhone 3G With Brando's Telescope
• Gorgeous Slow Camera Box Is Like an Analog Instagram

Urban teens are leaving CCD and CMOS sensors behind in favor of a technology their grandparents would have found familiar: analog film photography.

Originally posted at News – Digital Media

Anticipation, thy name is Galaxy S II. Or is it Galaxy S 2 Attain? Perhaps it’s Galaxy S 2 Function or Within, it all depends on what carrier you prefer, really. You see, the sleuths at Pocketnow have unearthed a silicone case for sale that lists those three names as the particular branding Samsung’s new flagship smartphone will enjoy with AT&T, Verizon and Sprint, respectively. That, combined with earlier trademark filings by Sammy asking for Galaxy Attain, Function and Within registrations, would lead us to believe that we are indeed looking at the final product monikers. T-Mobile is notably missing from the list, but we suspect that may be because its variant of the Galaxy S II is materially different in design to the original GSII. The good news for everyone else is that the same silicone case will be interchangeable among AT&T, Verizon and Sprint devices, leaving very little room for those guys to screw things up.

Samsung Galaxy S II US carrier names revealed: AT&T Attain, Verizon Function, and Sprint Within originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 May 2011 06:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Pocketnow (1), (2)  |  Wireless Xcessories Group  | Email this | Comments

Dude, check it out! Onlookers stare slack-jawed at the awesomeness of YikeBike. Photo YikeBike

You may remember the YikeBike, the little electric Penny-Farthing that looks like it should be carrying Tom from Tom & Jerry. And if you saw the fun, foldable commuter machine being “skillfully” “maneuvered” around the Wired.com car park Gadget Lab editor Dylan Tweney, it is likely burned into your brain forever.

The Yike bike is fun. It is also expensive, at $3,800. Around $1,800 of this is thanks to the carbon fiber body, which is the main reason the bike weighs just 10.8kg, or 24 pounds, the same weight as a medium-specced Brompton folding bike.

Thankfully, Yike has come up with the Fusion, a bike identical to the Yike except for the aluminum and composite used to build its body, and its price tag of $2,000. It still has the same 450-watt motor that will take you for six miles at 14mph, the same built-in LED lights and the same anti-skid regenerative brakes. The only real tradeoff is the added weight. The Fusion weighs 14kg, or 31 pounds, or around seven pounds extra.

Given the use-case for the Yike, which is for short point-to-point journeys (commuting), this probably isn’t a big deal. And you could always keep one in the trunk of the car, fully charged and ready for the day you finally flip and go on a gun-toting rampage. Think Michael Douglas in Falling Down — only on a nerdy little clown-bike — and you’re there.

The Yike Fusion is available now.

YikeBikes product page [YikeBike]

See Also:

• Hands-On: Eccentric YikeBike Gives Segway a Run for Its Money …
• Yike Bike Electric 'Mini-Farthing', Just $3600
• YikeBike: Cute Electric Penny-Farthing