iPhone body camera. Miveu X is a great idea, though the clunky style – reminiscent of the homemade strap-on bomb in “30 Minutes or Less” – means you’ll only use it when going undercover isn’t the point. For about $80, the iPhone 4/4S case comes with an integrated wide angle lens converter and although the contraption looks complicated, the company says you can easily pull the phone out to ensure you’re filming the action and not immortalizing your shoes.
Drone journalism starter toys. With a low price point ($100 to $120), the Wi-Spi line from Interactive Active Toy Concepts will propel a few experiments. There’s a helicopter or car version. Both record video and pictures and beam live feeds to your iPhone or Android device. You can show off your surveillance work by sharing recorded video on social networking sites. Watch the skies for these in fall 2012.
Bluetooth camera remote and flex mount. Mojos will like this: for about $40, you can mount your iPhone or iPod touch then use the Click Stick to snap pictures via a Bluetooth headset with remote shutter control. The companion camera app also features filters, editing and sharing options. Creators Dexim say it will be available late February.
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The following SOJO gear recommendations and instruction are provided from MultiMedia Shooter authored by Richard Koci Hernandez who has generously provided us with permission to reprint the materials here.
List of the apps and gear every mobile journalist should have, for their iPhone, of course.
I’m a Mac.
There are five Mac laptops of various makes and models in our home, along with three iPods, two iPhones and one iPad, which makes it highly unlikely that you’ll believe my next statement.
I am not an Apple fanboy.
Also,
I’m pro-choice.
Let me explain.
I’ve always believed in the storyteller’s right to choose his or her own ‘paint brush’ to tell their story. Who wants a tube of titanium white shoved down their throat when what they really want to paint with is cadmium green.
Early in my photojournalism career I used Nikon gear, because it worked best for me. It fit my shooting style, despite everyone around me clamoring for a Leica M6. Years later when Canon made a better product I switched.
I mention all of the above because I am going to extol the virtues of the iPhone and I want you to know while I’m ‘on the bus’ I’d hop-off the second someone, anyone, offered me a better ride. I’m not trying to convince you to buy an iPhone. I expect you’ll find the tool that fits your lifestyle.
Remember it’s not about the tools or the technology, it’s about the story. I try to focus equally on both here at mms. My last post, was all about story.
As a profession we are in need of some serious attention to technology, especially in the mobile realm. Speaking for myself, I’m getting a strong feeling that to be truly successful as a journalist of the future everything I do must be viewed through the mobile lens. That said, let’s talk technology.
Internal conversation:
OMG isn’t the iPhone just the greatest device in the whole wide world?
Duh, yeah!
I’m as excited by the story consumption aspects of the iPhone as with its story creation ability. Today I’ll focus my attention on the story creation apps and gear I find most useful for story tellers and in a future post talk about the story consumption aspects.
Let’s get going. I’ve used all of the following apps and gear to create various stories for both personal use and professional outlets. I hope you find some of these as useful as I have. They get the mms seal of approval. Not that that means much! 🙂
POWER
Using the iPhone as a mobile journalism tool comes at the expense of battery life. These two products have saved me frustration in the the field.
juice pack air™ BUY
As the world’s thinnest rechargeable battery case, the mophie juice pack air™ is designed to
virtually double the time you have to Rock, Talk, Surf and Send with your iPhone 3G or 3GS.The juice pack air™ is a rechargeable external battery concealed inside of a protective form-fitting case
for the iPhone 3G & iPhone 3GS. It offers you the full protection of a hard-shell case while providing
virtually twice the battery life of the iPhone alone; all in an ultra-thin, light-weight, low-profile design.
Whistler PI-400W 400 Watt Power Inverter BUY
This power inverter allows you to run AC appliances like laptop or a phone charger right from your car. It’s also great for emergencies and bringing the electric coffee maker on camping trips.
STABILITY
Nothing says amateur story teller more than blurry images or shaky video. These are the tools I’ve found most useful for recording smooth video or creating panoramas with my iPhone.
Joby GM2 Gorillamobile Flexible Tripod BUY
Zacuto Z-ZG-IPJ Z-Grip iPhone Jr. Handgrip System BUY
Not only is this great for hand holding, but it has a tripod mount at the bottom of the grip and a mount on top to mount a mic adapter or external light.
What’s an OWLE? BUY
The OWLE Bubo is a camera mount that brings the best features of a camcorder to the iPhone 3GS: stability, optics, microphones and tripods! The OWLE Bubo is made of a solid piece of aluminum, making it virtually indestructible. The OWLE Bubo comes standard with 37mm lens threading, as well as a 0.45x wide angle/ macro lens combination. This is a real piece of optics, delivering stunning images with better color saturation, contrast and sharpness than is possible with the iPhone’s camera alone. The wide angle lens accepts 49mm screw in filters which are sold separately. The OWLE Bubo provides 4 x 1/4″-20 female threaded mounting holes (1 on top and bottom of each of the 2 hand grips), as well as having a cold shoe mount and recesses allowing access to important areas such as the 3.5mm jack and bottom port of your iPhone while the iPhone is docked within the Bubo. Unseating the iPhone from the OWLE Bubo is easy even for those the thickest fingers thanks to the ergonomic access port. Watch the videos below to learn more!
iPhone Adapter 3.5mm 4 conductor TRRS Male to 3.5mm Microphone Input Jack BUY
So you can do this!
Read More about the above set-up here.
Description
– Create spectacular high-resolution images of up to 20 megapixels using your iPhone camera
Description
BEST APP on APPLE’s Rewind 2009 List and also featured in Creative Editing Kit by Apple.
Full-blown video editing for iPhone and iPad.
Compatible with HD video on iPhone 4!
Note: iPhone 3G & iPod Touch can import video by copy paste.
Description
Monle works with all external microphones, both those that plug into the headphone/microphone jack and those that plug into the 30-pin data connector. iPhone users can also record with the iPhone’s internal microphone. Monle records WAVE files with sample rates from 8kHz to 44.1kHz, stereo or mono, in 16-bit. All file formats can be simultaneously mixed and edited together.
Description
Pano for iPhone is an award-winning app that lets you take beautiful, seamless panoramic photos straight from your phone, no other software necessary. Selected by Apple as one of the “Best Apps of 2009″, Pano has gotten rave reviews from tens of thousands of users around the world! Pano is exclusively for iPhone.
Features:
– Deliciously simple interface
– Take 360-degree panoramas with up to *sixteen* photos
– Handy semi-transparent guide helps you line up each shot perfectly
– Advanced alignment, blending, and colour-correction algorithms provide seamless images in just seconds
– Finished panoramas save directly to your camera roll
– Final resolution of up to 6800×800
– Panos can be resumed if interrupted
CiL Writers can use the iPhone App to instantly:
- Create, launch and run live events
- Publish live commentary
- Approve and moderate Reader comments
- Publish Photos, Audio and Video in real-time
- Integrate Twitter – search for and post tweets
- Email event link and embed code
- Place events into Standby Mode
- End live events
- View live event listings
Description
overview
Have an iPhone? Have an Eye-Fi card? If not you should, these things rock!
Get the FREE Eye-Fi app for your iPhone to extend the Eye-Fi card’s benefit to your iPhone. Enjoy unlimited photo uploads straight from your iPhone to your computer or to the web. Stay organized as photos automatically land in preset folders in your computer. No syncing. No tethering. No hassles.
I’ve used an Eye-Fi Card and this app to shoot images from my Canon 5DMKII 1DMKII, also, wireless to from my iPhone then automatic to my Flickr account. Photo editor was able to download the images right from my Flickr and I didn’t have to stop shooting. NICE. To make this a little clearer, I use my Eye-Fi card in my Canon 1D and transmit back via a verizon express card using a Cradlepoint PHS300 with an adapter. If you want to know more about this just drop me an email and I’ll share my workflow. Sorry to have confused some folks. The iPhone app is standalone it DOESN’T work WITH my Canon 1D.
Description
- Enhance photos with multiple color adjustment: adjust color levels, exposure, contrast, saturation or manipulate the RGB.
- Apply filters such as the sharpen or the pencil filter.
- Crop, straighten and rotate your image.
Features I love about this app: ANTI-SHAKE, SELF-TIMER, TIME-LAPSE, CONTINUOUS RAPID-FIRE, PRESS ANYWHERE, 3-SHOT BURST and GRID OVERLAY. Plus it’s free!
Description
Then as soon as youre ready, you can compile the images into a video and share it in many ways: YouTube direct upload, Facebook, Vimeo, Email it, Export it to your Camera Roll so it syncs with iPhoto.OTHER RESOURCES:
iPod and iPhone Recording- GREAT hands-on review with audio examples of some high end recording devices
http://www.iphoneography.com – The best resource for reviews of new apps for both video and photos
5 Essential Tools for the Mobile Journalist Also Mashable has a great mobile/iPhone blog: http://mashable.com/mobile/iphone/
Poynter.org – News about mobile & its applications & implications for media by Damon Kiesow who also has some very good resource links on his delicious feed: http://delicious.com/dkiesow like: 12 Tips for Improving Camera Phone Photos – Very basic tips for non-photographers
Walker News Desk 