iPods and Cameras?

[Thataboy]

I don't see that this is such a big deal. I mean, how many people take SO many pictures at one time that they need to unload them away from their computers? For those that want this, there is a Belkin reader. I don't think this is a common enough problem to warrant anything built in.

What I CAN see is having a camera built into an iPod. I am not in the "stick everything in an iPod" camp.... I don't think video, phone, and high end PDA stuff belongs. But the interface and design of an iPod is perfect for a consumer camera... maybe 1.3 megapixels. Something that is point and click for everyday, nonprofessional situations. Add bluetooth and you can envision some fun sharing possibilities to cell phones and other iPods.

 

[looklost]

Obviously its all coming together now:
iPod... PDA... Cell Phones... other small electronic devices... will one day merge into one super iPod.

Ya, it looks like Apple is going to back door the PDA if they keep going at this rate. Come on Apple release Mac OS X mini.

 

[ryan]

What about a way of just simply connecting an iSight directly to an iPod?

 

[dongmin]

This is such a no-brainer. You kinda wonder why it took them so long to implement this. It'd nice to hook up your camera to the ipod via the dock connector and have the ipod automatically download the images into a virtual roll (or rolls) that could then be transferred to iphoto. To me, the lack of an easy import feature in the current ipod photos is a real dealbreaker.

 

[ASP272]

So many rumored iPod features . . . where will they all go?

With this iPod, I CAN RULE THE WORLD! (Plankton's voice)

 

[timster]

The Belkin reader is complete junk.

(Slow, unreliable, images are unviewable until offloaded, device is bulky, uses AAA batteries. The thing's a colossal con, nowhere near worth its price.)

I hope whatever camera reading functionality is added to iPods is substantially better than this.

 

[areyouwishing]

Whew! I was really worried, there were so many news stories about macs, I almost thought Apple Computer made computers too for a second. Thank goodness the recent crop of iPod rumors have come about to keep them in line.

 

[stukdog]

the real cool part

I'm not much into the photo, etc. What I really want to be true is the Bluetooth part of the rumor. I understand that music would take forever to sync. I have about 50 GB worth. but once I get my music on the conventional way, I would love to have my calendar, contacts, notes, and rss feeds transmitted each morning from my powerbook that has Bluetooth. Now that would get me to pick one up for sure.

 

[mcmav37]

But in my case, even if I can upload photo's to my iPod chances are I am still going to need to bring my laptop along with me for e mail and web surfing. So the ability to connect my digital camera to my iPod seems senseless to me and really becomes just another unnecessary step. I wish/hope Apple puts more effort into a Wi-FI or Bluetooth enabled iPod that will enable you to sync wirelessly with iTunes. After all, the reason I bought an iPod in the first place was to “portablize” my music collection.

I think what you need to recognize here is that the reason a lot of people want to be able to offload their photos to their iPod is that this solution is (a) much more portable than bringing a laptop into "the field" and (b) it is much more cost efficient. For example, I am going on a nice vacation this summer. I'm not bringing a laptop, but even if I was, I most certainly will not bring it everywhere I go. I also currently only have 1 512 MB CF card and I am using a dSLR so that could fill up rather quickly. So, I could buy say 4 GB of CF cards for upwards of $400 or I could use my iPod photo (which won't be much bigger than all these extra CF cards) and has > 30GB of free memory.

And yes, to answer other people's postings, there are many products that already do this, but none of them include an iPod music player. There are a lot of amateur/pro photographers--especially with the proliferation of cheap dSLRs-- and they are all pretty creative, and creative people tend to prefer Macs so many of them already have a Mac and/or an iPod, so there is a huge market for this.

 

[coolfactor]

And this is when the ipod craze will die.

Exactly. Apple knows that specializing (or at least marketing) the iPod for music is the only way to keep it popular. PDAs are dying because they have faded into the background... no strong point to make them stand out. PDA functionality will become transparent in our devices, so you don't need a dedicated device for it. The syncing functionality built into Panther is building on the goal of "information everywhere" life. We .Mac subscribers have that with our many computers already.

 

[aswitcher]

I really hope this release of the iPod Photos/whatever has the ability to read from cameras direct...else its going to come out later this year which will stymie my decision to buy now...

 

[thevil]

It's probably USB On-The-Go, here's the relevant page on PortalPlayer.com:

Copy or move photos from a digital camera via USB On-The-Go

 

[TheMasin9]

YES

News.com reports on comments by Gary Johnson, CEO of PortalPlayer.

PortalPlayer is the company which makes chips for the iPod as well as other hard drive based music players. According to Johnson, we are likely to see music devices that will connect directly to cameras to download photos. They are also working on direct Printer connectivity as well.

True to form, Apple would not comment and Johnson would not comment whether or not Apple will be incorporating this feature into future iPods.... but is a sign of the general direction of upcoming technology.

Belkin, of course, already makes a media reader for the current iPods which allows this basic functionality.

I have been thinking of this for quite some time now, apple has a sorage device that has a 2 inch color display as well as a milllion different people who make peripherals for it. Why not make a 3-4 mp camera that can plug into the dock connector port and shoot pictures with it. it would be such a great invention. I dont think were gonna see camerapods anytime soon, but sure as heck an ipod photo attatchment that would do the trick.

 

[MacSlut]

Ok, so if Person X has a camera with a 1GB CF card and wants to transfer its contents to a Bluetooth 2.0 enabled iPod, at what rate will the data transfer?

Oh, no...not that guy again...we're all doomed

Seriously though, I think this would be really cool if I had an Bluetooth Photo iPod and pictures could instantly transfer from my camera to the iPod. Does anybody know if it would be possible to make a Bluetooth CF card that would work in most CF based digital cameras? Or will this require some sort of adapter until if/when more cameras have Bluetooth?

 

[ocellnuri]

The iRiver H320 (Asian models from what I understand) can already do this. It's nice to see that other players will likely catch up soon.

 

[stephenli]

ok. all i need is a USB port and a high res, over 2.5 inch colour display.
something like DSC T1 may be fine....

Comeon Steve, this is the year of HD
may be it would end up with a HD ready portable movie player
we all have our own copyright with HD stuff created by iMovie, right?

 

[Chip NoVaMac]

A CF slot would be nice, but I don't see it.

Image Tank and a bunch of others have that market covered thoroughly.

A chipset that allows for using a camera USB cord to download would be a help for the photographer on the go. I know that I go shooting with my iPod on me.

 

[Makosuke]

A simple USB link to download a camera directly into an iPod--which seems to be exactly what this feature is--would be a perfect minor addition to the iPod. It's not a killer feature, it's not diluting the brand or overweighting the iPod at all, and it wouldn't increase the cost significantly (if the chip supports it, the software addition must be minor), which is important.

What it would do is provide one more reason to stick with the iPod brand and add a few more holdouts to the group. I know I'd love to be able to do this for long vacations (I don't have a laptop and wouldn't take one if I did, and a half-full 20GB iPod that I'd buy anyway is a lot cheaper than 10GB of flash cards). And my dad, who's an avid amature photographer, would definitely buy an iPod for this feature--he already asked if they could do this.

 

[Chip NoVaMac]

A simple USB link to download a camera directly into an iPod--which seems to be exactly what this feature is--would be a perfect minor addition to the iPod. It's not a killer feature, it's not diluting the brand or overweighting the iPod at all, and it wouldn't increase the cost significantly (if the chip supports it, the software addition must be minor), which is important.

What it would do is provide one more reason to stick with the iPod brand and add a few more holdouts to the group. I know I'd love to be able to do this for long vacations (I don't have a laptop and wouldn't take one if I did, and a half-full 20GB iPod that I'd buy anyway is a lot cheaper than 10GB of flash cards). And my dad, who's an avid amature photographer, would definitely buy an iPod for this feature--he already asked if they could do this.

With the introduction of the Mac mini, release of iLife 5 with RAW support in iPhoto, and the rumored color screens in more iPods; my thinking is that we will see more iLife integration into the iPod as time passes.

 

[lamewing]

Hmmm,
Not that this matters, but Sony produced a music player last year, the VGF-AP1L Pocket Vaio, that allows for direct picture download from a number of digital cameras. The player itself, esp. after the firmware update which allows for mp3 playback, is a NICE machine. It is too bad that Sony's Sonic Stage 2.3 software is so poor.
I hope more players take advantage of this ability as clearing our camera's memory stick will be a snap...even when we are on the road.

 

[joecirca79]

The point is...direct connectivity from camera to iPOD would make life a lot easier. I shoot a canon 20D in large Jpeg and the files range from 6MB to 8.5MB each. IT is also a lot easier to lug around an ipod than a laptop. Flash Memory isn't cheap(for the higher speed/capacity memory cards) and a lot of photograpers don't like using huge cards in case they fail...too many images lost. Lastly, the ipod photo's screen probably has a lot better resolution than a lot of camera lcd's.

 

[jared_kipe]

This would be a pretty obvious feature for any future ipod photo. And other ipods would benefit for it too.

 

[silvergunuk]

Anyone else think the motorola itunes phone will be unveiled tomorrow/today aswell as the new ipods?

 

[swissmann]

Obviously its all coming together now:
iPod... PDA... Cell Phones... other small electronic devices... will one day merge into one super iPod.

I sure hope so. I love my iPod but hate hauling around so many gadgets. I want them all in one. The only drawback is if it breaks they are all gone.

 

[Mr_Ed]

I don't see that this is such a big deal. I mean, how many people take SO many pictures at one time that they need to unload them away from their computers? For those that want this, there is a Belkin reader. I don't think this is a common enough problem to warrant anything built in.

What I CAN see is having a camera built into an iPod. I am not in the "stick everything in an iPod" camp.... I don't think video, phone, and high end PDA stuff belongs. But the interface and design of an iPod is perfect for a consumer camera... maybe 1.3 megapixels. Something that is point and click for everyday, nonprofessional situations. Add bluetooth and you can envision some fun sharing possibilities to cell phones and other iPods.

I agree the Belkin reader is already an option for those who really need to offload their memory cards. No need for a built-in reader but I have to believe people filling up their photo memory cards is a fairly common problem. It really doesn't take much to fill up a memory card, especially if you shoot high resolution pics in RAW mode or something like that.

A built-in camera might work for some but I personally would not like it. I think it would increase the size/weight of the iPod and I would find it useless unless it had decent (>=4MP) resolution. I like to say "if the picture is worth taking, it's worth a camera." I also have never been a fan of multi function devices (camera/phones, scanner/fax/printer combos, TV/VCR or TV/DVD combos, stripper/maid combos, etc.) because:

- If one function fails, you're stuck with it for the other functions
- I would feel I paid for something I didn't want in the first place
- The vast majority of such devices are "jacks of all trades and masters of none" and are typically mediocre (or worse) in performing at least one of the functions.