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Cameras

The Swiss Army knife of USB drives

Apparently no gadget is safe from mad scientists who want combine all manner of functions into a single device. The latest target of Dr. Frankenstein wannabes is the lowly USB drive.

The prosaically christened "5-In-1 128 Camera Memory Stick" from Aggeggi takes photos, records video, stores music, provides Webcam feeds and holds 128MB of data in its USB flash drive. (It also looks about as exciting as its name.)

As Ministry of Tech says, none of the $195 device's features is very impressive on its own, but it does deserve some credit for combining so many things … Read more

Spy clock feeds paranoia

Here at Crave, we stay paranoid so you don't have to. Where else, for example, can you find cautionary notes about an eavesdropping table lamp and a spy-cam clock in one place?

The latter was brought to our attention by Chip Chick, who says the "WiLife Spy Camera" is the "only networked camera concealed in a digital alarm clock." (Talk about esoteric claims.)

So far as we can tell, it's pretty much like other Wi-Fi spy cams we've seen that send video feeds back to a remote PC or other screen. The option … Read more

160GB of portable photo backup

Wolverine Data has released a new 160GB portable multimedia player that photographers can use to offload images from memory cards while in the field.

The $550 Wolverine ESP Model 5160 has a 3.6-inch LCD and slots to accommodate Compact Flash, SD, xD, Memory Stick Pro and other flash memory cards. And it can display JPEG images as well as those in "raw" formats taken directly from an image sensor without in-camera processing.

The 10-ounce device supports raw formats from Canon, Nikon, Fujifilm, Olympus, Kodak, Pentax, Minolta, Konica Minolta, Panasonic, Contax, Leica and Sony, Wolverine said. Photographers also … Read more

Olympus hints at new digital SLRs

Taking a page from Nikon's playbook, Olympus is offering glimpses of new digital SLRs it appears likely to announce in conjunction with the Photo Marketing Association (PMA) trade show next week.

An image at Olympus' European Web site shows two dimly lit SLRs labeled March 5, 2007--three days before the PMA show begins--and a larger hulking silhouette with no date.

Olympus trails Nikon and Canon in the digital SLR market. The company has allied with newcomer Panasonic, though, and the same "four-thirds" system lenses can be used on either company's digital SLR cameras. Olympus also uses … Read more

SeaLife. SeaLife run.

Waterlogged photos have cause to rejoice, as SeaLife has announced two new cameras. Like all SeaLife cameras, the Reefmaster Mini and the Ecoshot feature waterproof, beefed-up casings for rough shooting. The Reefmaster Mini can handle depths as much as 75 feet, the Ecoshot can sink as far as 130 feet underwater, and both cameras can handle drops of as far as six feet.

Other than their extreme ruggedness, the 6-megapixel Reefmaster Mini and Ecoshot are rather lackluster cameras. With a 42mm-equivalent, fixed-length lenses, they're not going to win any prizes for best feature sets. They have a unique Spy … Read more

Pantone's HueyPro: Huey's not a baby anymore

You might not realize this, but you're probably not looking at accurate colors right now. The different photos you see on Crave probably aren't being reproduced accurately through your monitor. Reds might be slightly pinkish or slightly more orange, blues might be a bit green, even simple white and black might be just a tiny bit beige and purple.

Every graphical display, whether a small monitor or a big television, needs to be occasionally calibrated. This usually involves sticking a funky-looking device on the screen and either changing the settings until the device tells you to stop or … Read more

Sony Line Show 2007: Complete coverage

Fans of Sony products are often disappointed at the January Consumer Electronics Show to discover that the company doesn't have very much to say. Sure, there's a big Sony booth and a handful of token product announcements and press releases, but it's always small potatoes compared to the dozens of new items on display from competitors such as Samsung, Philips, and Panasonic. But that's entirely by design: rather than get lost in the CES maelstrom, Sony opts to launch its new line of products at its own Sony-only line show. We've got complete coverage of … Read more

New Sony Superzooms

Sony's latest pair of superzooms, called the DSC-H7 and DSC-H9, add longer zoom lenses, higher resolutions, face detection, and a handful of other nifty features, including high-definition output. This last feature has found its way into all the company's new Cyber-shots, as was mentioned in our post about the new W- and T-series cameras.

Both of the new models include 8-megapixel CCD sensors and 15x optical, 31mm to 465mm-eqivalent, zoom lenses with optical image stabilization. Just in case that stabilization isn't enough for you, Sony also upped the top sensitivity rating on this year's models to … Read more

Sony Cyber-shot cameras: Now in high-def!

Sony's still thinking small with its Cyber-shot digital cameras, keeping most models thin, light, and easy to pocket. The company just announced its spring lineup of Cyber-shots, which includes no less than five new T- and W-series cameras that measure less than an inch thick.

The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-W200 is the first ultracompact digital camera to break 10 megapixels. The W200 features a 12-megapixel sensor that can record images up to 4,000x3,000. The W200 joins the 8-megapixel Cyber-shot DSC-W90 and the 7-megapixel W80, which share the same 35-to-105mm-equivalent optical zoom lens, the same 2.5-inch LCD screen, … Read more