It's déjà vu all over again: just like last year, the most impressive innovations we saw at CES -- imaging or otherwise -- came from Kodak.
[Other top draws at the show include Sanyo's low-cost hi-res camcorder, and a see-in-the-dark sensor from Korea. Details are all in this week's Briefing.]
More than 150,000 attendees from 110 countries walked 1.67 million square feet of exhibit space to see the wares of more than 2,500 companies at the 2006 CES. The Consumer Electronics Association predicts that industry sales will climb from $125.9 billion last year to $135.4 billion this year.
All told, the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada was once again a huge exposition, filled this year with even more huge screens -- LCD, plasma, rear-projection, and, shown for the first time at a major public venue, the likely winner in the TV toss-up: SED, the CRT-like display technology jointly developed by Toshiba and Canon.
The opening night keynote from Microsoft chairman Bill Gates really debuted -- nothing. Mostly, he just gave a very long demonstration of Vista, the next version of Windows that is now promised for the end of 2006. [Vista's photo browser will have photo editing built in, and video clips will work in photo slideshows. Not much else caught our eye. Even Justin Timberlake looked bored during his walk-on.]
Robin Williams was quite funny at Google's announcement of its video website -- but despite the "Google helmet" he initially wore as a joke, we don't quite see how the speech by Google's co-founder rated a keynote position at a consumer electronics showcase...
COOL CAMERA COMBINES DUAL OPTICS, SENSORS
While Kodak launched two other cameras and a partnership with Skype for better online photo sharing [see below], the stand out device at the show was the EasyShare V570.
Kodak promotes the camera as the first dual-lens digital still camera. What the company isn't widely discussing is that the camera also has *two sensors,* each with 5MP resolution.
We chose this camera as the stand out device not so much for what it is -- although it is a fun, quality camera -- but for what it represents. And what it represents is a real break -- at last -- with film camera paradigms, and an innovative use of digital imaging to overcome a consumer photography challenge.
That challenge was providing an optical zoom range greater than the now-standard 3x, and providing the wide-angle view many photographers enjoy -- all while staying within the popular ultra-compact thin form factor -- and within the crucial price range of less than $500.
The new camera has a 5x zoom -- but is does not have a pricey 5x optical zoom lens. Instead the V570 couples a 23mm ultra-wide angle lens with a 39-117mm optical zoom lens, all in a pocket-size case that is less than an inch thick -- and, at a time where smaller cameras generally cost more than large ones, for a price of $399.
Each lens has its own 5MP sensor -- but to the user, this does not feel like two kludged-together cameras. Instead, the view in the LCD seamlessly switches from one sensor's feed to the other's based purely on the zoom toggle switch. [A "digital zoom" smoothly takes the 23mm lens's view to approximately 39mm before the camera switches optical paths -- but in our use of the camera in Vegas and the days that followed, we found this more annoying than useful and were happy to switch it off and quickly jump from the ultrawide view to the standard 39mm.]
The camera also has a panorama mode that helps users align three shots, then, in-camera, stitches them into a full 180-degree panorama -- with a correction that removes most barrel distortion.
The V570, like most cameras now, captures full-screen MPEG-4 video at 30 frames per second. This looked particularly good when coupled with the wide lens in a shot from a car's sunroof when going down Las Vegas Blvd at night. [We'll post the video on our website this weekend.] The camera measures 4 x 2 x 0.8 inches and weighs 4.4 ounces, and has a nice 2.5-inch LCD.
PEREZ PROMOTES PARADIGM BREAK
Speaking at CES, Kodak Chairman and CEO Antonio Perez showed that the V570's break from film camera designs is no accident: "Today's digital cameras are dinosaurs, with the same basic architecture and functionality as the box Brownie camera that Kodak introduced more than one hundred years ago," Perez said. "It's a lens, shutter and something to capture the focused light. All the imaging industry has done is to replace silver with silicon. In the next era, we will design digital cameras from the ground up to take full advantage of the creative power that digital technology provides."
Perhaps not incidentally, Kodak also changed its venerable logo: the traditional yellow box with the large serif 'K' is gone, and the new logo features a curvy sans serif typeface.
Perez was joined onstage by Motorola Chairman and CEO Ed Zander, and the two announced they were signing of a 10-year global product, cross-licensing and marketing alliance between Kodak and Motorola. Kodak also partnered with Skype.
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