Samsung’s new NX100 is a cut-down version of its mirrorless NX10, coming on a like a compact camera to the NX10’s slimline SLR design. Like its older brother, the new camera has an APS-C-sized, 14.6 megapixel sensor and shoots 720p video. What it lacks is the bigger camera’s electronic viewfinder (although Samsung will sell you an add-on which slots into the hotshoe). But that’s not the point. The real news is in the lenses, which use something called “i-Function” to make the camera easier to use. I-Function puts buttons on the lens itself. Hit the switch and you can then cycle through settings like white-balance, ISO, shutter speed, aperture and exposure compensation, controlling them by turning the focus ring on the lens. Yes, it has taken years of research and innovation (the word “innovative” is used six times in the press release) to finally put an aperture ring back on the lens, just where it had sat since time began. Samsung is also changing the descriptions of its lenses. Now you can buy a “landscape lens” or a “portrait lens”, and these i-Function lenses will tell the camera what they are so the camera can configure its own settings. This is called lens-priority mode, and compatible lenses will have little icons on them to let you know just what they are. I really like the on-lens control idea, but the auto-settings business seems a little gimmicky, and maybe even pointless on a camera clearly aimed at an enthusiast, not a point-and-shooter. There will be accessories, too. Joining the viewfinder will be a GPS unit, and there are two lenses at launch, a 20-50mm ƒ3.5-5.6 zoom and a 20mm ƒ2.8 pancake lens. Other NX lenses will work, too, but you don’t get the fancy new features. Pricing and availability are yet to be revealed. Given that an NX10 can be had in a zoom kit for $700, my guess is that the street price will be $500 to $600. The camera will come in black and (as seen in the gallery below) brown. > > View all NX product page [Samsung: Not yet listing NX100] See Also: Samsung NX10 Limited Edition in Black and White Zero to Hero: Five New NX Lenses Put Samsung in the Game Micro Four Thirds Sony Fights Micro Four-Thirds With Lens-Changing Compact 5 Reasons to Ditch Your Digital SLR Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a stand for the iPad, and so of course it is called the iStand, but it’s also an elegant piece of furniture. The Danish-designed stand is aimed at POS use (no, not that POS) and holds the iPad at a handy browsing height allowing customers to flip through catalogs, menus or any kind of information. I can imagine these in use both as educational aids in museums and also by clipboard-nazis as they deny you entry to their lame but “exclusive” nightclub. The iStand has space for a dock-cable and bolts shut around the iPad. It also covers the home button to prevent tinkering, so you’d better be sure you have launched the correct app before you lock it up. It tilts and swivels, too, depending on how you want to use it. The company behind the iStand, InSilico, also makes companion apps, although these are not listed in the app store. They are pretty self explanatory: They’re called iCatalogue and iMagazine. I’m thinking it would be pretty cool to put a couple of these in Wired’s reception hall showing the iPad version of the mag (or better, tuned to the Gadget Lab page). The only problem there would be in the New York office, where Bureau Chief John C Abell does a lot of his “work” in the comfy reception-area armchairs, and his snoring might scare people off. Depending on the price of this simple metal pole and mount, the iStand plus iPad combo could be a very cheap way for businesses to get a custom interactive POS system. Knowing what I do about the costs of velvet ropes and stands, though, the iStand is likely to cost more than the iPad itself. iStand is here [InSilico. Thanks, Kim!] See Also: The Pencil iPad Stand: Smart Enough to Impress a New Yorker … Compass, an Elegant Fold-Up Stand for iPad Joule: An Elegant, Minimalist iPad Stand Wired Bureau Chief Builds iPad Stand from $6 Doorstops Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s a stand for the iPad, and so of course it is called the iStand, but it’s also an elegant piece of furniture. The Danish-designed stand is aimed at POS use (no, not that POS) and holds the iPad at a handy browsing height allowing customers to flip through catalogs, menus or any kind of information. I can imagine these in use both as educational aids in museums and also by clipboard-nazis as they deny you entry to their lame but “exclusive” nightclub. The iStand has space for a dock-cable and bolts shut around the iPad. It also covers the home button to prevent tinkering, so you’d better be sure you have launched the correct app before you lock it up. It tilts and swivels, too, depending on how you want to use it. The company behind the iStand, InSilico, also makes companion apps, although these are not listed in the app store. They are pretty self explanatory: They’re called iCatalogue and iMagazine. I’m thinking it would be pretty cool to put a couple of these in Wired’s reception hall showing the iPad version of the mag (or better, tuned to the Gadget Lab page). The only problem there would be in the New York office, where Bureau Chief John C Abell does a lot of his “work” in the comfy reception-area armchairs, and his snoring might scare people off. Depending on the price of this simple metal pole and mount, the iStand plus iPad combo could be a very cheap way for businesses to get a custom interactive POS system. Knowing what I do about the costs of velvet ropes and stands, though, the iStand is likely to cost more than the iPad itself. iStand is here [InSilico. Thanks, Kim!] See Also: The Pencil iPad Stand: Smart Enough to Impress a New Yorker … Compass, an Elegant Fold-Up Stand for iPad Joule: An Elegant, Minimalist iPad Stand Wired Bureau Chief Builds iPad Stand from $6 Doorstops Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter. Read the rest of this entry »

You know when your uncle Pete comes back from a fishing trip and tells you about the giant trout he caught? “It was this big,” he says, stretching his hands out in front of him. Well, with the Smart Finger, you’d know exactly how big “this” is, and you could put an end to uncle Pete’s stupid lies and exaggerations right away. The Smart Finger actually uses two fingers. The pair of plastic tubes slip over your real fingers and measure the distance between themselves. This distance is shown on an OLED display in your choice of unit, in metric or good ol’ ‘merican, and a click of a switch will store it in memory for later transfer to a PC. It’s a wonderful concept. Just like uncle Pete, we tend to use our hands and fingers to describe size, and measuring length is a natural extension. The gadget itself is also rather nicely designed. The two halves join together to make a single bullet-shaped capsule which slips into a USB charging-dock, and the interiors of each part have a silicon membrane with a hole in the centre to grip any size of finger. Thank God they made it in green, though, as it already looks a little too much like a Fleshlight. Is it as useful as a tape-measure for a quick check to see if the new fridge will fit in the gap left by the old one? Probably not, but for an extended measuring session, this concept design would work great. And if it gives you chance to shut uncle Pete up once and for all, it’s got to be worth it. > > View all My Fingers Are So Smart, They Measure [Yanko. Thanks, Radhika!] Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the pleasures of writing in pencil is the friction of two solid materials in contact. One of the delights of writing in pen is that you can write continuously without having to stop to sharpen your stylus. Writing in metal, while expensive, provides some of the benefits of both while exhibiting its own unique beauty. These two (that’s right, two) different metal pen manufacturers come to us by way of champ design blog Dornob . Both models work on the same principle: a tiny amount of metal alloy transfers from the pen to the page. Unlike pencil, it can’t be smudged with your hand, and unlike ink, it doesn’t need to dry. The amount of alloy for each stroke is so tiny that the pens are expected to last a lifetime without needing to be refilled or replaced. You can sharpen the tips for a finer point with a little sandpaper. Each company takes a slightly different approach. The Inkless Metal Pen by Vat19 goes with a full stainless-steel barrel. Their marketing department, as you can see from the video above, also has a sharp, playful, dudely sense of humor. (The word “awesome” gets thrown around a lot, and there’s a Scrooge McDuck reference.) Grand Illusions goes a little more highbrow with their Metal Pens . They have two short versions (including one that can be worn as a keychain) and a Beta Pen which comes with a full-length extension in either black or silver metal or cherry-stained wood. Grand Illusions also appends a short history on writing in silverpoint: “In the Medieval period, artists and scribes often used a metal stylus in order to draw on a specially prepared paper surface. Generally known as Metalpoint, or Silverpoint when the stylus was made of silver, artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Dürer and Rembrandt all used this technique.” My friends, this is music to my early-modern-loving ears . (Luckily, you don’t have to rub your paper with pumice to get these 21st-century pens to make an impression. The alloy in the Vat19 pen (at least) has trace amounts of lead, so it’s not so good for kids. Both are targeted for designers, lefties (who often have to deal with smearing or smudging ink/graphite as they trace their hand across the page), and geeks who like even their handwriting to be all shiny. (Note: the writing isn’t actually very shiny, more kind of a matte titanium, but you can pretend). > > View all Images via Vat19 and Grand Illusions. Story via Dornob. See Also: Continuous Pencil Means No More Stubs Sharpie Reinvents Pen with Liquid Pencil The Hidden Link Between E-Readers and Sheep (It's Not What You … Drawdio: A Pencil That Lets You Draw Music Livescribe Updates its Digital Smart Pen With the Echo UDraw Pen and Tablet for Wii German Multi-Tool Pen Engineered to Outlast its Owner Read the rest of this entry »

One of the pleasures of writing in pencil is the friction of two solid materials in contact. One of the delights of writing in pen is that you can write continuously without having to stop to sharpen your stylus. Writing in metal, while expensive, provides some of the benefits of both while exhibiting its own unique beauty. These two (that’s right, two) different metal pen manufacturers come to us by way of champ design blog Dornob . Both models work on the same principle: a tiny amount of metal alloy transfers from the pen to the page. Unlike pencil, it can’t be smudged with your hand, and unlike ink, it doesn’t need to dry. The amount of alloy for each stroke is so tiny that the pens are expected to last a lifetime without needing to be refilled or replaced. You can sharpen the tips for a finer point with a little sandpaper. Each company takes a slightly different approach. The Inkless Metal Pen by Vat19 goes with a full stainless-steel barrel. Their marketing department, as you can see from the video above, also has a sharp, playful, dudely sense of humor. (The word “awesome” gets thrown around a lot, and there’s a Scrooge McDuck reference.) Grand Illusions goes a little more highbrow with their Metal Pens . They have two short versions (including one that can be worn as a keychain) and a Beta Pen which comes with a full-length extension in either black or silver metal or cherry-stained wood. Grand Illusions also appends a short history on writing in silverpoint: “In the Medieval period, artists and scribes often used a metal stylus in order to draw on a specially prepared paper surface. Generally known as Metalpoint, or Silverpoint when the stylus was made of silver, artists such as Leonardo da Vinci, Dürer and Rembrandt all used this technique.” My friends, this is music to my early-modern-loving ears . (Luckily, you don’t have to rub your paper with pumice to get these 21st-century pens to make an impression. The alloy in the Vat19 pen (at least) has trace amounts of lead, so it’s not so good for kids. Both are targeted for designers, lefties (who often have to deal with smearing or smudging ink/graphite as they trace their hand across the page), and geeks who like even their handwriting to be all shiny. (Note: the writing isn’t actually very shiny, more kind of a matte titanium, but you can pretend). > > View all Images via Vat19 and Grand Illusions. Story via Dornob. See Also: Continuous Pencil Means No More Stubs Sharpie Reinvents Pen with Liquid Pencil The Hidden Link Between E-Readers and Sheep (It's Not What You … Drawdio: A Pencil That Lets You Draw Music Livescribe Updates its Digital Smart Pen With the Echo UDraw Pen and Tablet for Wii German Multi-Tool Pen Engineered to Outlast its Owner Read the rest of this entry »

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep (image: square-enix.com) If kids grow up fast, videogame franchises grow up slow. I hadn’t really settled down to a Kingdom Hearts game since our second child arrived, which I realized today was a good five years. It’s been that long since the last console iteration. The other portable editions like Chain of Memories and 358/2 Days felt more like spin offs to me that a genuine attempt to move things forward. Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep happily makes good on some old promises. What’s more, my now five year old son is more than happy to watch me play the game – although there are one or two scenes where he needs a cushion to hide behind. I don’t know about you, but I’m offer a little wary of letting my kids watch me play games, particularly if they have an older ESRB rating. But a little time with Birth by Sleep and my son was enough to realize this was a game well suited to family gaming . Having been waiting for a new Kingdom Hearts since before he was around, it was special to finally get one I could share with him. It’s diminutive nature, and Disney setting means that although some scenes are a little ‘full-contact’ I was happily able to share the experience. I had expected only the console release of Kingdom Hearts 3 to be able to scratch my Disney Fantasy itch, but Birth by Sleep has shown just how much can be accomplished on a handheld. We’re still having a good time as we work through the game story, and our breakfast combination often drifts into particular nuances about how the three plots interact with each other. Three apprentices are on offer to play, and you can tackle each in any order as they follow distinct interconnected stories. These combine to make Birth by Sleep something of a long game (around 24 hours in total) but there is enough of a story here to keep my son interested – and asking detailed plot line questions. If you’ve not spent time with a Kingdom Hearts game before this is a good place to start. I know first time you come across the strange combination of Final Fantasy and Disney worlds it seems rather odd. But it’s the sort of ill-advised mash-up that videogames excel at. What results is a more light hearted – although no less complex – rendering of a Final Fantasy style adventure. It’s a cross over that is perfectly pitched for families. Read the rest of this entry »

The first three books in the Amulet series Way back at the end of 2007, Mike “Gabe” Krahulik of Penny Arcade mentioned that he’d read Amulet and said, “if you are a fan of comics I suggest you do the same.” He called Kazu Kibuishi “one of the most talented individuals working in comics today.” And then moved onto the subject of Dickerdoodle cookies. That’s Penny Arcade for you. I decided at that time to go ahead and order Book One: The Stonekeeper for myself, not knowing what to expect—like I said, Gabe didn’t really say much about the book itself. I’d seen some of Kibuishi’s comics in the Flight anthologies that he edits but that’s about all I knew of his work. I read it and enjoyed it, but then forgot to look for the next book until this spring when I happened to see Book Two: The Stonekeeper’s Curse at a bookstore and picked it up. By this time, though, my six-year-old daughter had learned to read and was starting to get into comics. As I was reading Book Two she kept looking over my shoulder. I said, “Hey, this isn’t the beginning of the story. You should go read the first book, and then you can read this one.” She read both books that afternoon, and then asked me where the next book was. I said: “You’ll have to wait.” Well, Book Three: The Cloud Searchers is finally out this month. I got an uncorrected proof from the publisher to preview (and had to fight my daughter for a chance to read it), and now we’re both eagerly awaiting the next one! Here’s the story: after Emily’s father dies in a car accident, her mother moves them (with little brother Navin) to her great-grandfather’s old house. Pretty soon they discover some odd things about the house, including a mysterious amulet which begins to speak to Emily after she puts it on. When their mom is snatched away by a tentacled creature (see that thing on the cover?) Emily and Navin set off in pursuit, and find themselves in a parallel world, filled with monsters, unfriendly elves, and a house full of robot helpers left behind by great-grandfather Silas. Kibuishi has created a world with a lot of depth, and it really draws the reader in. The amulet Emily finds grants her amazing powers but also demands her allegiance, which she is hesitant to give. You’re never entirely sure who to trust—there aren’t always clear-cut bad guys and good guys. Sure, the anthropomorphic fox guy looks friendly but is he hiding something? And even the treacherous-looking elf (he’s got sharp teeth , for cryin’ out loud!) might turn out to be an ally. Since Emily and Navin are just kids, they have to decide who to trust and where to go on their own. The artwork is dazzling, clearly influenced by anime but with Kibuishi’s own style. Every so often you get an establishing shot on a full-page spread and it’s like a scene from a movie. One of my favorite scenes comes at the end of the first book, when you discover a secret about Silas’ house … but I don’t want to give it away. But it’s a scene that made me want to stand up and cheer. There’s plenty of action throughout, but not so much that there’s not time to develop the characters, either. Amulet is targeted at middle readers—it’s listed as ages 9-12—but I think younger kids could enjoy it as well, as my daughter did. Just be sure to preview it, since there are some parts that are a little more frightening. And it’s certainly one that older kids and adults will love, too. I don’t know how many books are projected in the series, but wherever Kibuishi takes us, we’re happy to go along for the ride. Click here to read the prologue from the first book, and then get started with Book One . Heck, buy all three now and save yourself the wait later! Wired: Heroic kids, a mysterious talking amulet, a mechanical rabbit named Miskit, Leon Redbeard the fox-man, need I go on? Tired: Okay, yeah, not everyone likes talking animals, but the story hints that there’s actually a reason for their existence. Disclosure: I received an advance proof of Book Three for review purposes. Read the rest of this entry »

Image Courtesy of JustJon Jon of JustJon Online built a Lego TARDIS for an upcoming BrickFair he is attending . That alone warrants serious geek cred, but he didn’t stop there. Using an Arduino and an Adafruit Wave Shield he added the Dr. Who theme and an LED. There’s a video of the TARDIS in action at Jon’s site. Jon used an interesting Lego technique called Studs Not On Top (SNOT) to get the window framing just right. You can check out Jon’s write up on SNOT if you want to learn more about it. Now if he could only make it bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. Via Makezine . Read the rest of this entry »

This accessory was as inevitable as the hangover that follows the annual Gadget Lab post-CES party (where we enjoy a fabulous dinner at Denny’s followed by cheap wine sipped from stolen paper-cups in the liquor-store car-park). As soon as we saw the new iPod Nano’s clock-face app, we knew there would be a wrist-strap for it. We weren’t disappointed. The strap has the pun-tastic name Rock Band and comes from a company called iLoveHandles. The Nano can be set to use the clock as its lock-screen, so a simple touch is enough to bring up the face and check the time. The Rock Band is a wrist-strap onto which the Nano clips (it has the same clip on its back as the Shuffle) and becomes an oversized wristwatch. Well, oversized if you’re not used to hefting a tacky chunk of gold Rolex on your arm, that is. It’s a great idea, and not really that much different than the sports armbands that have held Nanos to the upper-arms of sporty people for years. I guess that if you were actually going to listen to music while wearing this, you’d need to run the cable up a sleeve to stop it constantly snagging, but that’s not big deal. The Rock Band is $20, and is surely only the first in what will be a rather crowded market. Rock Band product page [iLoveHandles. Thanks, Avik!] See Also: IPod Nano Follow us for real-time tech news: Charlie Sorrel and Gadget Lab on Twitter. Read the rest of this entry »