I literally cannot see the point to this thing. The transparent display is cool I guess. They don't state the camera specs on it though which seems odd for a camera.
Optical viewfinder cameras see through a lens and force-align your eyes, so when you change the lens, what you see is different but highly aligned to what the sensor sees.
Here, depending on where you place the thing you see a different thing than the sensor does, the optical path is completely uncontrolled, unless they're doing eye tracking and post processing?
This seems somehow worse than a cell phone camera.
Correct me if I am wrong here, but isn't this just a low-quality camera sensor attached to a gimmicky transparent LCD? This is an interesting novelty, but as others have mentioned already, the function of the viewfinder doesn't make a lot of sense.
Given how cheap this is, I feel like this makes for a great camera to give to a kid. The camera gets out of the way (no built-in games like a lot of kiddy cameras have) and the focus is placed on framing and taking photos, then reviewing later.
I'll probably pick one up just for my kids to experiment with.
it'd be fun to have a version where a ToF sensor or some distance measure can help make sure you are holding it the right distance away.
i also think people are really going a bit too wild over the "hold it the right distance". sure it's not perfect! but hold your arm out away from you & look through a "viewfinder" box you create with thumb and finger, and move your hand forward and back half a foot. if you start with your hand close to you, yeah, it's going to make a big difference. but if your hand is away from you a good bit, that back and forth does not make that much difference.
and as others have pointed out, there's plenty of street photography where people really do try to shoot from the hip. not all picture taking needs to be precise. heck, i often shoot blind from my phone! hold it up, point, and shoot.
this feels like such a great device to get up the hackles of highly-constrained people. :)
Honestly, this is genius. It's dirt cheap, which was unexpected, and it gives you the excitement of shooting blind with the gorgeous feeling of looking through an optical "viewfinder". Of course the framing won't be perfect, but that's nothing new from TLRs and viewfinders cameras.
They could have made this like $100 to take advantage of curious enthusiasts and the instagram types, but I'm shocked they didn't
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[ 3.4 ms ] story [ 39.6 ms ] threadHere, depending on where you place the thing you see a different thing than the sensor does, the optical path is completely uncontrolled, unless they're doing eye tracking and post processing?
This seems somehow worse than a cell phone camera.
I'll probably pick one up just for my kids to experiment with.
i also think people are really going a bit too wild over the "hold it the right distance". sure it's not perfect! but hold your arm out away from you & look through a "viewfinder" box you create with thumb and finger, and move your hand forward and back half a foot. if you start with your hand close to you, yeah, it's going to make a big difference. but if your hand is away from you a good bit, that back and forth does not make that much difference.
and as others have pointed out, there's plenty of street photography where people really do try to shoot from the hip. not all picture taking needs to be precise. heck, i often shoot blind from my phone! hold it up, point, and shoot.
this feels like such a great device to get up the hackles of highly-constrained people. :)
They could have made this like $100 to take advantage of curious enthusiasts and the instagram types, but I'm shocked they didn't
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48779844