Posted 10.14.2011 at 2:01 pm
7 Comments
Ball Camera
Jonas Pfeil
Our friends at Popular Photography found a concept camera we'd definitely love to try: a throwable, ball-shaped camera that uses its 36 cellphone camera sensors to take a 360° panoramic shot when thrown. It actually senses the apogee of its toss--the moment when it's suspended at its highest point--and captures its entire surroundings simultaneously. Check out more at PopPhoto, including a video of the ball in action. What can we say? We love ball-shaped things.
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There was a recent article from POPSCI and a homemade rocket that soared 121,000 feet. It would have been fun, had this camera ball been launched from the nose of this rocket and later retrieved.
What happens if you don't catch it?
I say attaché a string to it, so if you do miss a catch it does not go rolling\bouncing away. Following that, I say give it to the police and military. It gives another tool, to see the bad guy around the corner or up a hill or other hiding places. Might even help spot a sniper too.
Great Green Balls of Fire!
Now the instant replays in soccer will be spectacular!!!!
And for the other countries, that is football, ROAR!!!!!!!
I think it would be very cool to have 1,000 or more of these floating around our solar system. Spherical telescopes, someone, if you haven't already done so, please make that happen...
QuantumQuantum,
The problem with YOU, I just read your profile and previous comment and well you’re really smart and write very well. So that is your problem. You just do not comment enough. Please take that as a compliment and I hope you comment more often! Good night sir.
I am glad you are commenting today. I hope to see more of your thoughts. ;)
ahhhh! This made my day! No, it's not a cure for cancer, and won't pay off the national debt, but it's serendipitous, whimsical, fun, and something that anyone would love to tinker with.
The next logical extension of the idea would be to construct a massive slingshot with large sections of surgical tubing, and launch it up a couple of hundred feet or so, or maybe heave it off the top of Half Dome, or maybe one of the really tall skyscrapers, or dangle it from a bungee cord into some enormous salt caverns or sink holes. For the latter uses, you'd probably also want to jury rig a pattern of high-power LEDs for flashes to give it some illumination... they didn't mention, but maybe it has an extended exposure range, in which case if you yoyo-ed it into such a cavern it could take a time exposure and accumulate enough light to take a decent shot even if the cave/cavern is quite large.
Maybe they could have some truly practical applications as well, such as after earthquakes and similar disasters. We could drop them down into collapsed structures to find victims trapped in rubble.
Bill Dale