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The Polaroid Pogo Portable Printer

July 4th 2008 00:48

The Pogo Arrives

The Palm size Printer

Polaroid, the company responsible for mass producing instamatic cameras back in the day is hoping to launch a new tech revolution with its latest consumer item. Released today (July 4th) the Pogo hand held portable printer is looking to replicate the instant gratification that Polaroids original all in one photo development system had.

USB and Bluetooth compatible the Pogo, prints borderless 2 inch by 3 inch images straight from your digital camera, mobile phone or any other new age photographic devices. Compact and portable, the unit is around the size of a deck of playing cards.

The Pogo at work

Using ZINK technology (zero ink printing) the crystalized paper inside colourises when exposed to heat. From the official Polaroid Pogo site:
“The patented ZINK Paper is an advanced composite material with embedded yellow, magenta and cyan dye crystals, activated with 200 million heat pulses, in 30 seconds, in a single pass. With 100 billion crystals in a 2x3" print, the paper is 100% inkless. A ZINK-enabled printer uses heat to activate and colorize these crystals. Because there is no ink, every ZINK-enabled device has the unique benefits of being small, simple, elegant, and eco-friendly.”

Stephen Smith, the company's UK managing director, said: "There's nothing on the market quite like it. The technology is brand new. Everywhere I go people go "wow" when they see it…We reckon it'll be just as successful as any of our previous launches."

A closer look

If like me the majority of images you capture on digital devices end up on your PC but seldom in hard copy, this invention aims to change all that. Costing around $150 US the paper for the machine is $10US for 30 sheets.

Here are the specs from the official Polaroid Pogo Site:
2” x 3” borderless, sticky-back prints
Bluetooth, PictBridge compatible
Smudge-proof, water-resistant, tear-proof photos
Fade-resistant, long-lasting images
No waste – no ink cartridges
Prints in about 60 seconds
Rechargeable lithium-ion battery

How it Works - The Polaroid Pogo

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Posted By: Dexter - Category: Cameras, Gadgets, Home, Video

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The Bionic Arm is reality.

May 30th 2008 05:09

A mind controlled Artificial Limb.

Dean Kamen and the revolutionary arm

When I was a kid watching Lee Majors as the Six Million Dollar Man I failed to see the practical applications of his robotic limbs. To a 10 year old it was the super strength that they seemed to enable that was the most attractive thing.

Now, awareness of the plight of amputees and those who are unable to control their limbs puts a more empathetic perspective on the development of inventions like the latest from DEKA research.

Reported from the D6 conference on allthingsd.com, DEKA founder Dean Kamen demonstrated the new “luke arm” (Empire Strikes Back anyone?). Astounding, this mechanical arm actually responds to mind commands, working much like the Bionic Man or Luke Skywalker’s new hand.

Working for the good of mankind

An engineering marvel that renders the mechanical claw redundant there is a precision to the digits on the hand that seems almost impossible. Wired.com says “The arm is fully articulated, giving the user the same degrees of movement as a natural arm, and is sensitive enough to pick up a piece of paper, a wineglass or even a grape without mishap.”

Here is a blow by blow rundown of what happened at the D6 conference from allthingsd.com:

• Walt and Kara welcome Kamen to the stage.
• So what’ve you been working on? Kamen recalls a visit with some very high-level people from DARPA years ago. The good news, they told him: Battle fatalities have greatly declined. The bad news: Many soldiers that survive battle have lost their arms. And the prosthetics we currently have don’t offer bilateral movement or fine motor control. Kamen says they charged him with developing a new prosthetic that could offer those things. “I looked at them,” said Kamen, ” and I said you’re nuts.” We don’t have the technology yet. How do we interface with the human body? “You think you have trouble with the Vista interface,” quips Kamen.
• Kamen pulled together a bunch of creative folks, did a bit of research and decided to try to build the arm. DARPA asked him to build it in two years. Kamen said he’d build it in one.
• And almost a year later he had.
• Video of a man with two functioning arms demonstrating an exoskeleton version of the arm. He scratches his nose, picks up a pad of paper ….
• Kamen queues up another video that features an amputee who’s lost both his arms, using the Luke Arm after less than two hours of training. After passing a small ball to a colleague, the man pours a drink and then feeds himself for the first time in 13 years.
• Queueing up another video in which a man who has had the arm connected directly to his nerve endings controls the arm simply by thinking. Kamen says it took just a day for the user to learn how to use the arm to do basic things like picking up a glass.
• Kamen talks about the difficulty of this process–with so many possible degrees of freedom, how does someone wearing one of these arms learn to operate, say, a backhoe?
• Kamen says DEKA solved this problem by creating macros that could be programmed into the arm to shorten this process. Video demonstration of the “ball holding” and “power-drill operating” macros, among others.
• We took these things down to a Veterans Administration building to test them out. He found that the arm was difficult to attach because of varying degrees of amputation. Also found that many amputees don’t wear their current prosthetics, because they’re too heavy or uncomfortable or difficult to wear. Kamen worried that the Luke Arm would meet with a similar reception unless he solved these problems.
• DEKA went back into the lab and added a set of air bladders to the arm harness, along with a pneumatic pump that makes the arm not just more comfortable, but easier to use. Also quite powerful. Can lift weights as large as 40 lbs.
• Moving on to another video which shows an amputee using the arm to pick up grapes one by one and eat them.
• Kamen hopes someday to connect these prosthetics directly to the brain–non-invasively.
• On to next Kamen passion: education. He thanks Melinda Gates for setting up the crowd, then makes his pitch: We’re the only country wherein minority kids and women get the message that they aren’t suitable for science or math careers. So let’s turn science, engineering, etc., into a fun sport. In short, he says, we got 23 companies to develop sports-like teams and an annual competition through FIRST (for inspiration and recognition of science and technology). The organization has grown: 13,911 schools from 38 countries. He asks the audience to help.

Here is footage of the DEKA “Luke Arm” at work.

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Posted By: Dexter - Category: Gadgets, Video

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Sony HDR-TG1 - World's Smallest Full HD1080 Camcorder

May 16th 2008 07:20

The world's smallest full HD1080 camcorder is due to land in Australia any day now with pre-sales available through Sony Central and/or Sony Style stores throughout the country.

Priced from $1,599.00, the HDR-TG1 features a 2.7" WIDE Touch Screen and is officially the world's smallest, lightest, and slimmest camcorder offering 1920x1080i 'Full HD' video recording in an exciting package weighing just 300 grams!

Featuring a scratch resistant pure titanium body design, the Sony HDR-TG1 is robust, small and light enough to be carried around anywhere and everywhere in pockets or bags. Other highlights of this camcorder include:

Face Detection - this technology enables the camera to detect a human face automatically and to adjust focus, colour control and brightness accordingly.

Zoom Microphone - the built-in microphone automatically "zooms" with the lens so that one person's voice in a large crowd can be captured clearly while other sounds will be less prominent.

Film Roll Index and Face Index - this function allows the user to preview the beginning of scenes and create scene indexes set at specified display intervals (3, 6, or 12 seconds and 1 or 5 minutes) - perfect for seeing what was recorded in a long take. Face Index allows the user to begin playing scenes simply by pressing the human faces detected during shooting.

4.0 Mega Pixel Still Image Capture - the HDR-TG1 features a high quality 4.0 Mega Pixel camera lens. The still image camera also works during full motion video recording.

Backup HD Footage to AVCHD Disc Without a PC - DVDirect (VRDMC5) allows you to burn the videos directly onto AVCHD without a PC. [sony.com.au]