Front-Facing Cameras for the Rest of Us
posted Sunday Dec 12, 2010 by Scott Ertz
CES (Consumer Electronics Show) 2011 is coming up quickly, January 5, and we are starting to see a lot of cool new devices that we may or may not see on the show floor. This week's exploration into the new is called OneMoreFace. It is an adapter you add to the top of your smartphone to add a forward-facing camera.
Right now the device is only a prototype and only designed for the HTC Google Nexus One, but the designer has promised commercial viability in the near future. I also expect to see this start showing up for other smartphones that are missing the popular Qik-enabling feature.
Want to know how this works? Hit the break.
This device clips on the top of the phone and covers the existing camera. Using two mirrors, it reflects the image from in front of the phone into the lens on the back of the phone. This gives two advantages. First, it adds Qik capability to older handsets like the Nexus One and the Samsung Moment. It also gives the ability to use the higher quality camera for video chatting.
While the device might not be convenient for carrying around everywhere all the time, it certainly is a cool proof of concept for front facing cameras on older handsets. Maybe a little more work could make the gadget more convenient, but for now it is a cool idea.
If you have an older handset, would you use this to give yourself video chatting capabilities? Let us know in the comments.
