Recent development by the Microsoft team, the Sense Camera, has recently been developed. According to what I know about the camera, it was designed to capture photographs passively while it was worn. In other words, the camera will capture photographs automatically upon wearing it. This camera does not has a display. This makes it weird. How could it be possible for a digital camera to have no display at all?


Caption: Sense Camera

According to the Microsoft development team suggests that this camera is not an ordinary camera. I think the main purpose of this camera is to assist disabled users or people variouse disease such as the Alzheimer's disease (lack of memory) - this camera will definitely help them with their daily life. All they need to do is to comfortably wear the camera around their neck. Since the camera is light, I assume wearer should not have a problem wearing it.


Caption: SenseCam

The lens of the camera was maximised so it could couple every possible thing in front. Simply speaking, the lens of the camera was able to completely capture everything in the wearer's view! I am definitely sure that an ordiginary digital camera would not able to do something like that. The camera comes with many different and useful features. These include many different sensors monitored by a microprocessor, i.e. light sensor (maybe similar to solar power where the camera will turn on automatically when detect some light?), a passive infrared detector based on body heat, temperature sensor and a multiple-axis accelerometer. It says "Any sensor readings will automatically trigger a photograph to be taken". This is really amazing.


Caption: a photograph taken by the Sense Camera

From my justification, significant changes in light level or the detection of body heat will trigger the camera to snap a photo. I think the user may also elect the camera to operate on a timer. This means that the user can adjust the timer to capture a photograph every 5 minutes automatically. According to the Microsoft team, the latest software of the camera will be able to detect the position of the camera. Anyway, I think this function is supported in the Iphone 3GS. Therefore, they should operate the same way.


Caption: highlight of the camera

Okay, this is interesting. Although the camera only supports VGA mode (640 x 480 pixels), it can store 30, 000 images. However, as written in their research paper, stated that "Most users seem happy with the relatively low-resolution images". How could it be possible? Anyway, you can also read the research paper here (click here for Paper 1 and Paper 2).

The prototype version of a product is always a little dull. The quality should not attract their customer. However, the second version should look much better, in term of quality.