No one likes to watch TV ads. But when you have $60,000 worth of iPod arranged to do the falling domino effect bit, it changes the perspective a bit. The ad was commissioned by Tekserve, an independent Apple specialized store in New York City. They assured us no iPod was hurt or injured during the making of this commercial.

Stretching the capabilities of the iPod, Bella Corporation has introduced Catapult, a new device that allows users to capture video footage from DV or HDV video cameras directly to iPods and virtually any USB-based storage device. The Catapult comes in a convenient piggy-back neoprene pouch that is designed to hold an iPod or a 2.5-inch USB device. It features time lapse and remote trigger recording, which are particularly useful in recording nature and wildlife events (as well as those hush-hush surveillance operations). It also has a Pre-record setting that is terrific for sporting events, and a Post-record setting, used in conjunction with a motion detector, which is useful when, say, trying to record hummingbirds visiting a feeder.

The Catapult will be available in the second half of 2006 and will be priced under $300.

A couple weeks ago I posted about my Boot Camp Fantasy. It seems that someone has hacked a similar functionality. Linked below is the video of it on YouTube. Basically they used Parallels to run the 'other' operating systems within their OS X environment. Then they fiddled with Virtue - an open source Virtual Desktop app - so that a cubed transition to a next desktop would reveal the operating system they want to work with.

Looks pretty sweet! I wonder what the hardware specs are on the Intel Mac Mini they're using. I'd imagine the RAM is way up there... Anyhow - looks cool, and I bet it works pretty nicely for them as well. Thanks for making my fantasy a reality (sort of)!

In an ever-growing market of entertainment and technology, ABC is trying to keep up by offering free downloads of the very popular TV series 'Lost', 'Desperate Housewives', and 'Grey's Anatomy'. The idea is to get their identity out to the public by getting their advertising presence online where most people are these days.  Currently ABC sells shows through Apple's iTunes store for $1.99 which has has overshadowed ABC substantially. The free downloads will be available at ABC.com in May and will be ad-supported.

Jeremy Horwitz down at iLounge has had the fortunate task of reviewing a pair of eMagin's newest wearable display, the EyeBud 800. A pair of these costs in the region of $500, and according to the writer there are many adjustments to be made, so the display they reviewed was more a final production prototype. Essentually what these are, are a display that you can wear close to your eyes so you can view your iPod's video out source without the use of a big TV or having to look at the iPod's small screen.

The concept behind these are simple, yet very effective. It incorporates the use of an 'eyeshade', a pair of earphones, a battery/video circuitry box and final a single small display that is screened to one eye. While screening to one eye might sound a bit weird, because of the eyeshade your other eye cannot see anything, so therefore you assume one whole image. The screen is an OLED display that is affective up to 800x600 pixels and offers a wide array of 24 million colours. The screen is specifically designed for the iPod's video quality and therefore should look pretty good, however if any of the video's have been poorly compressed or offer less than average quality then the display will make them look artifacted. When coming to how the user wears the display, the design isn't by placing the unit on the nose like glasses, instead it uses a headband of elastic which according to the reviewer, felt pretty good.

The power is through a box the size of a 4G iPod which can either supply 4 to 6 hours of continuous playback, or you can run off a USB 2.0 connection or a standard plug in the wall. By using the iPod, its own battery isn't affected. The control is simple, via a single button on the box which controls the brightness and the on/off state.

According to the writers, the unit is one of the best that they have encountered, and as of yet there are still adjustments and improvements to be made on the current to future models. The use of the screen is very good for those who dont have a large display or want to use it on long travels without having to hold the iPod continuously.

A user over at Mac OS X Hints called Nathan Gartz under the alias QuadProcessPower, has posted an interesting piece on how to get your iPod to play 704x304 mpeg's on your iPod without clipping, and also this works through the TV-Out to give VHS standard quality video's. This is of course way better than Apple's specification of 480x480 pixels for mpeg. He found this out by accident while using HandBrake, but he goes on to say that the H.264 file format doesn't support larger screen sizes, as one of his friends tried. This obviously adds a bit more interest in the iPod, you can actually watch even better quality video's on your TV.

It's not real, but looks KILLER.  If - or really, when - Apple comes out with a cellular phone, this is the sort of design and creativity I expect we'll see.  I'd probably buy one.  I'm a nerd like that. 

Course now there are some in the industry saying that Apple has hit some issues with their design.  They opted to start from the ground-up, rather than re-branding an existing model.  I'd expect nothing less from Apple.  They'll power through and have something cool for us relatively soon, I'd bet on that.

Post your favorite iPhone or iTalk mock-ups over the past years. There's plenty out there.  I think the one in this Google Video is my favorite by far though.  Link to the Google Video is below.
Via TUAW.

We've got to love our iPod videos. First, we could listen to our favorite music. Next, we could watch our favorite videos! It has all the things you need to keep you up to date with all the lovely movies available online. Now, we could even watch an entire film festival with our iPod's!


Indie film community, The Flux, is conducting its first iPod Video Film Festival. Those who are interested to watch are invited to join the Flux community. By joining, you can have access to all the movies that are participating in their festival. You can either watch them online or download them to your iPods. After having viewed them, you can vote for your favorite film in the website. There are three categories in this film festival: music videos, indie films, and student films.

Most of the films are fun and spiffy. I would recommend to watch the music video Stronger by Public Symphony and the indie film Superheroes by Paul Preston. Both films are witty and enjoyable. It just proves to show that entertainment can come in big or small.

Scrubs, an NBC hospital comedy produced by Disney-ABC Television Group has been added to the iTunes collection of downloadable media. While common practice for network broadcast studios to license TV series. At $1.99 per episode this smash hit will be the first ever show licensed by a competing media companies to become available for download over the Internet.

The iTunes media collection has grown to over 60 series available for download since Apple first worked out a deal with ABC in October of 2005 to offer commercial free downloads of the networks biggest hits.

The ground breaking deal between ABC and NBC has paved the way for future shared revenue programs to become available for purchase over the internet. Niether ABC or NBC have commented on this deal but it was rumored that this month the two companies would be closing a deal leaving a 50 / 50 split of all revenue produced from the sale of Scrubs over iTunes.

Here's something Spielberg- or Jackson-wannabe's can salivate on.

Apple's award-winning video editing application, Final Cut Pro Studio, is now available as a Universal Binary product that can natively run on both PowerPC and Intel Macs. Depending on upgrades, it can consist of Final Cut Pro 5, an application that features new multicamera editing, native HDV support, better editing tools, scalable real-time effects processing, advanced real-time color correction and image manipulation filters, and audio control surface support; Soundtrack Pro, Apple's latest audio editing and sound design application; Motion 2, a professional motion graphics application that boasts of breakthrough functionality and smooth workflow to artists, editors and independent producers; DVD Studio Pro 4 that sports HD DVD support for both H.264 and HDV, and advanced authoring options like Alpha Transitions, and multiple video and audio tracks.

Prices vary depending on upgrades and universal crossgrades. New users should expect to shell out US$1,299 while upgrades from Final Cut Pro 1, 2 or 3 are $699. For those wishing to get the Universal Binary version, crossgrades start at US$99. I know, that's a lot of cash, but hey, at least shipping is free. Besides, directors and producers earn millions right?