Every Friday I pick a random product on Instagram, I disassemble it, examine it and make a stop motion story with its parts. Every week the result is completely different and unexpected.
Here I share how it all comes about
My last Tinker object was a pocket camera Called Palm Clix. My brother bought this years ago, he doesn’t even remember if it worked or not, or if he ever even tried it! I don’t know why anyone would buy this to be honest.
It’s a cheap camera that costs around $11, but of course, it takes crappy photos! It only has the capacity to hold 26 photos if it’s on it’s highest resolution mode which is 640x480 px. I think it was produced in 2011 (it was listed on amazon around that time) so it wasn’t a revolutionary product for cameras, and mobile phones did exist!
After reading the reviews I see that most people didn’t enjoy it, the majority said it didn’t even work. The only positive thing that I can say about this product is that on their website they have the manual and installation software provided in case you lost the CDs. The other pocket camera I opened a few months ago didn’t have anything on the website, and some people actually purchased it without the CDs and couldn’t even use it! I guess this applies to all devices that require a certain installation process, would always help to find manuals and installation software online! So that you know, you reuse it again after dusting it off from a box somewhere.
I know it’s a gimmicky cheap product, but people do buy them. Maybe some think the photos will have a unique artistic effect or some get them for their kids. Which actually is an interesting point now that kids are brought up in a "high tech" environment. They see their parents on their phones or iPads snapping photos all the time and you’d have to provide them with a similar experience.
Photography is very interesting in every way and kids would have a blast learning the basic concept of a pinhole camera. We don’t have a very hands-on education here in Egypt (maybe nowadays things changed in private schools) But for me, my first real photography experiments I did were in design school. I recall the disposable camera I “won” with a KFC meal, but I really don’t remember taking real photos with it.
This reminds me of the Sugru camera proofing and I wonder if somehow we can design products that can be used by both adults and kids. Maybe not only things we are afraid they'd drop (side note: I know adults who drop their phones more than kids do) but also things we think they can't use at certain age, but actually do use, like say forks and spoons for example.
Parents, what would you do? Buy a cheap camera? Wait until they are older? Risk it and hand in your iPhone?
That's it! Stay tuned for this week's Tinker Product! Follow along on Instagram (if you aren't already) And don't forget to subscribe to The Tinker Mail!
And here is a youtube playlist I created for all the tinker videos I watch to learn new things every week! So nerds like me who like learning can explore this in their free time.