Posted on 06/08/2005 4:25:06 PM PDT by anniegetyourgun
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) - For years, disposable cameras have been a magnet for last-minute photographic whimsy, encouraging all manner of embarrassing pictures from weddings and other social events. Watch out: There's now a disposable video camera.
The $29.99 pocket-sized digital video cameras are able to capture up to 20 minutes of video and sound.
CVS Corp. stores, which has exclusive rights to sell them, will process the camera for $12.99 and return a DVD; users also can e-mail video and video greeting cards.
Pure Digital Technologies Inc. developed and designed the camera with just three buttons. One starts and stops recording, another is used to play back video and the third deletes recorded segments.
Grant Pill, director of photography and imaging at CVS, said the camera is ideal for people who don't want to spend hundreds of dollars or fuss with too many controls.
Available now in the Northeast and elsewhere by the end of the month, the video camera looks similar to a point-and-shoot disposable camera, except it's held vertically to film.
The camcorder weighs 5.5 ounces, Pill said, and is about the size of an MP3 player.
Users watch what they're filming through a rectangular, 1.4-inch wide color display. There are no zoom features. After filming a segment, the user can review what's been recorded and choose to delete the segment at any time during playback.
Pill called the film good VHS quality, but acknowledged it isn't on par with that produced by some personal camcorders.
"George Lucas isn't going to use this to shoot Star Wars IV," he said, "but a budding George Lucas may use this to shoot something in his backyard."
Geeks to buy cameras, tear them apart and figure out how to use them without paying CVS $43 each use.
These will be great once some geeks take the time to hack them so you can download and decode the video data with your PC :-)
Yep get one now. Once they have been hacked you won't be able to find one for sale.
Great minds..etc :-)
loser technology.
How many times is someone going to pay $43 for these before they realize they could get a decent, cheap real camera? I've seen a few for under $80 (Microtek, the scanner people have one; 3 Meg for still) and I'm sure someone out there will find a cheaper one.
Who needs this? One more button to clear memory and start over. No big deal.
Yeah I am not impress I go to CVS RX often
I think they try get people come into store more often that probably reason they doing it
Of course not. He shot that decades ago.
I heard CVS has hired Paris Hilton to field test them.
A little hacking and you have yourself a nice little reusable digital videocam for $29.95.
You may want to grab one or two of the first ones out - once the hack appears they may change the next production run to foil the hacks.
The thing is too small and light to get any stability. I hope they have some type of corrective software to fix that problem.
Here's what I found so far on it -
http://www.imaging-resource.com/NEWS/1118158996.html
... and the hacking begins...
http://www.linux-hacker.net/cgi-bin/UltraBoard/UltraBoard.pl?Action=ShowPost&Board=cameras&Post=49&Idle=0&Sort=0&Order=Descend&Page=0&Session=
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