QindredCam captures the moment so you can get on with living it (hands-on)
This teardrop-shaped lifelogging camera recognises faces so it knows when you're talking to someone and starts recording.
Sometimes you're just too busy living those magic moments to remember to whip out your camera and capture them -- and other times you're too busy with your camera to really live in the moment. Wouldn't it be great, then, to have a camera that quietly captured life, leaving you to get on with living it? That's the principal behind QindredCam.
QindredCam is a lifelogging camera: a camera that you wear around your neck or clipped to your clothes, which takes pictures or shoots video of what's in front of you, then saves those memories online for you to browse through later. Where previous cameras have taken pictures at set intervals, the QindredCam recognises what's going on and starts snapping when it thinks something interesting is happening.
The camera's software recognises faces, lighting and movement and starts shooting video when it sees you talking to someone. If the lighting isn't good enough for video it takes a picture. The camera's manufacturer Acumulus9 plans to add other triggers to start capturing, such as recognition of pets.
You can also instruct it to snap away by tapping the front, or pressing a button in the app. The camera wirelessly connects via Bluetooth with your phone so you can see what the camera sees on the screen of your mobile device, and control what the camera is doing. There's already an Android app, but an iOS app for Apple devices isn't expected until later this month.
You don't need to connect a phone: the camera stores images and video on its 4GB memory, and as soon as it spots a Wi-Fi network it uploads everything to the cloud. You can then see your pictures online. If you pay for a subscription, you get added extras like unlimited storage, curation -- which picks out the most important pictures and videos -- or a highlight reel that combines your memories in one film and sets them to music.
Where these cameras often fall down is the quality of the image, because it's hard to fit in a decent lens and still keep the device small enough to wear unobtrusively. Inside the QindredCam is an 8-megapixel Sony sensor with a 140-degree wide angle lens, and it shoots up to 1080p high definition video. I tried it out in a relatively dark room and the quality seemed passable, but with the image noise you'd expect in low light. I'd expect it to struggle in darker situations such as parties or night-time adventures.
The camera promises 10-15 hours of battery life, depending on how active it is. That's enough for a day out but not a weekend away, especially if you're going off the grid with a camping trip or something else that will take you away from your plug sockets.
Qindred will be on sale soon for $149, which works out to roughly £95 or AU$190.