Sad Search Terms
Posted on | January 21, 2011 | Comments Off on Sad Search Terms
We thought we’d take a look and see what we could find on the search terms that people are using with Google. Do any of these look familiar?
- samsung front facing camera
- android front facing camera
- droid front facing camera
- droid with front facing camera
- front face camera phone
- front facing camera android
- front facing camera droid
- front facing camera phone
- phone front facing camera
- phone with front facing camera
We look at that list and think: “That is so sad.” These people have drunk the Kool-Aid. They have swallowed the blue pill. Or for those of you who prefer a more obscure reference…
They are in the thrall of the deus deceptor.
But, hey, who of us hasn’t been a bit deceived in our lives? We all need a little help from our friends.
So, here’s your “little help” when it comes to front-facing cameras: If you absolutely have to buy a phone with a front-facing camera, you go for it. But, don’t say that we didn’t warn you that anything is better than the ridiculously low-resolution sensors the manufacturers are putting in the current crop of smartphones.
And, if your brave enough to hold out and demand something better? Just get yourself a Vainworks Stand. It will tide you over until the good, front-facing cameras get here.
Flip Your Rear!
Posted on | January 19, 2011 | Comments Off on Flip Your Rear!
So you might be wondering: But… if I don’t have a front-facing camera, how am I going to do video calling? How am I going to take self-portraits? How am I going to record video of myself?
Answer: You’re going to FLIP YOUR REAR!
All you need is a couple of mirrors, some foam-core board and some hot glue. It’s pretty easy to do. You just need the mirrors at a right angle and a platform for the camera that juts out at 45 degrees.
On the other hand, if you’re not the handy type, an inventor in southwest Missouri has done the hard work for your. He’s selling an invention that he calls the Vainworks Stand. It’s a deskstand with mirrors to flip your rear-facing camera into a front-facing camera.
We’ve seen it and it works great for the iPhone 3GS, Droid, Droid 2, Droid Incredible, Samsung Galaxy S (AT&T), among others. (The guy has a big chart on his site and an explanation for how to guess if your phone is going to work or not based on where your rear-facing camera is.)
So you can either build your own or check out the Vainworks Stand. One other cool thing about the Stand: The inventor used all local vendors and the thing is manufactured in the United States.
Questions and Answers
Posted on | January 15, 2011 | Comments Off on Questions and Answers
Here’s some quick answers from the questions you might have:
Does the iPhone 3GS have a front-facing camera? No.
Does the iPhone 4 have a front-facing camera? Yes. But the resolution is on 0.3 megapixels so don’t expect to use it for anything except video calling. If you want to take a picture or a video of yourself, you’ll have to stand in front of a mirror (or use something like the Vainworks Stand.)
Does the original Motorola Droid have a front-facing camera? No
Does the Motorola Droid 2 have a front-facing camera? No
Does the Motorola Droid Global have a front-facing camera? No
Does the Motorola Droid Pro have a front-facing camera? No
Does the HTC Droid Incredible have a front-facing camera? No
Does the Samsung Vibrant have a front-facing camera? No
Does the Samsung Captivate have a front-facing camera? No
Are you starting to see a pattern here? There’s a whole lot of phones–new phones with beautiful screens and fast processors–that have been released just months ago that don’t have front-facing cameras. But, they still seem to sell just fine.
That’s because the people who are buying those phone have decided that having a front-facing camera isn’t the end-all, be all. Or maybe they have decided that if they are going to have a front-facing camera, they want a good one.
Don’t Buy the Front-Facing Camera
Posted on | January 13, 2011 | Comments Off on Don’t Buy the Front-Facing Camera
When you’re looking to upgrade your phone, don’t believe the hype. You don’t need a front facing camera. For sure, don’t buy the phone just because it has a front-facing camera.
Look at all the specs. Try out all the phones. Read lots and lots of reviews.
If you end up with phone that has a front-facing camera, great!
But don’t make that your only reason to buy… because once you understand what you’re really getting in those tiny, low-resolution, high cost add-ons, you’ll realize that you could have gotten more phone for your money is you weren’t so worried about whether or not it had a front facing camera.
If you decide to spend your money getting the best phone for you and it doesn’t have a front facing camera? Well for less than $20, you can get something like the Vainworks Stand. That thing will get you all the front-facing camera functionality that you need for the next few years.
What’s VGA Resolution?
Posted on | January 10, 2011 | Comments Off on What’s VGA Resolution?
If you look into the specs on most of the front facing cameras, you’ll read that they have “VGA resolution.”
Now… when you read that, you might be thinking… “VGA resolution”?! What’s “VGA resolution”?
That’s because for the last twenty years, digital camera manufacturers have rated their products in “megapixels.” In 1991, Kodak released the first professional digital camera for photojournalists. It was a Nikon F-3 camera with Kodak 1.3 megapixel sensor.
Ever since, when a company has wanted to talk about a camera, they tell us the number of megapixels. For instance, the iPhone 3GS has a 3.2 megapixel camera. The original Motorola Droid has a 5 megapixel camera.
The iPhone 4 had 5 megapixel rear-facing camera. But… mysteriously… when everyone talks about the iPhone 4’s front-facing camera, it’s “VGA resolution”.
What?! What happened to giving us the resolution in megapixels?
The dirty little secret is that “VGA resolution” is actually 0.3 megapixels! You read that right, it’s one-third of a megapixel.
Let’s put this into perspective. You can buy a “key chain mini spy camera” on Ebay for about $10 that has better resolution (720 x 480) than a “VGA” camera (640 x 480).
It’s pretty easy to to guess why the smartphone makers would suddenly start taking “VGA” instead of “megapixels”