By David Ponce
You’ve probably seen the TV types framing shots with their fingers, doing an L square with their hands. You might have done it yourself. Well what if we told you that there’s a chance you might one day be able to take pictures, or even film by doing just that. It turns out researchers at Japan’s Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences are working on just such project. And while they’re still very far from any sort of commercial product, they have made some interesting progress. The device you see pictured above is dubbed the Ubi-Camera and it fits over an index finger. On one side there’s a camera lens and sensor, while on the other is an IR range finder. You simply move the focal point around by moving your fingers away or towards your face: nearer to your face for wide-angle shots or further away for close-ups. Press a button and the shot is snapped.
There are some pretty major hurdles at the moment, like the range finder getting out of whack by lighting conditions. Also there’s no zoom; zoom is entirely done in post processing. Still, considering the tech being developed here, it’s not a stretch to think that in a couple years we may be buying finger mounted cameras that we frame with our hands.
VIA [ Engadget ]
