The Swiss Army Camera

For the last several weeks, I’ve been toting the The Aiptek DV4500 everywhere I go. People see me using it and ask “What is it?” A better question might be “What ISN’T it?”

The Aiptek pocket cam is one of several such gadgets available online, although I have yet to see such a thing advertised to the general public. There’s IPODS, camera phones, phone/mp3 combos, and Kodak’s new still/video camera, but this is something else.

They call it a 6-in-1 multi-function device. I call it a Swiss army camera. It takes digital stills (natch). It takes MPEG-4 compressed videos in the form of Windows media ASF files. Neat. Plus, it’s an MP3 player and a voice recorder. That’s 4 functions so far — plus I guess they count the USB 2.0 connection and the RCA output. Very handy. With the 1 gig flash card I purchased for it, I can hold as many files as I need. Once in a while I hook it up to a PC and dump the old and load it up with new music.

I made sure I got a unit with a built-in flash for the still camera. The still results have been good (see my halloween pics), but the video quality leaves a lot to be desired. I was attracted to the fact that there’s no tape involved, but you need a LOT of light to get good imagery. Also, hold the camera still or you get jittery results. Still, it’s perfect for quick & dirty web quality video.

Ordinarilly, when putting video to the web, I need to capture it from tape into a hard drive using firewire or other video inputs. Then I need to export from an edit program two or more times to get the compression and size I want.

With these already compressed files, I simply dragged and dropped ASF’s into my hard drive, used the Windows Movie Maker program to edit, and exported once to get a perfectly servicable WMV file. See the results over at the Philrose Productions website.

The MP3 aspect is fun, but nowhere near what an IPOD can offer. No playlists, abbreviated song titles, and a slight hiss on playback. The front panel, which remains open when headphones are jacked in, will probably break off eventually. It gets snagged on things, so I may just cut it off. There is a built in speaker, which is nice if I’m alone in a quiet room. I’ve fallen asleep a few nights with the audio playing.

For my purposes, the MP3 function has been okay. I’ve been listening to downloaded podcasts and indie music. One drawback to listening to long (20 minutes or more) files is that it’s difficult to cue up to the middle if you stop and want to pick up where you left off. There are fast forward and rewind options, but they only jump 10 seconds at a time. That’s a lot of button pushing.

The interface is easy to understand. The main “trigger” button just does the main action depending on what mode you’re in. It took just one evening to learn everything I needed to know.

The 4500 runs on two AA batteries. Nothing fancy or hard to replace. I picked up some rechargeables, which is necessary as the unit will run down after about 3 or 4 hours of constant use. When plugged into a USB, the camera draws power from the computer.

I tell people it’s a toy, and it is. At only $110 dollars plus the memory card’s $75, I wasn’t expecting the world. But what it lacks in quality it makes up for in versatility. As an animator, I plan to take some video for the sole purpose of rotoscoping. That doesn’t require broadcast quality video, so I’m golden.

UPDATE: READ THE “SWISS ARMY CAMERA REVISITED” REVIEW FROM ONE YEAR LATER.