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As a parent, I take a lot of photos and videos of my children and the things we do together as a family. I edit most of the photos but barely any of the videos, because who has time for that? Even when I manage to set aside some time to go through them, I get sucked into a rabbit hole of watching old videos of my son laughing for the first time or my daughter running around the house with a waste can on her head. Those videos are adorable, seriously.
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That’s why the announcement of a Kickstarter for a new HD video camera that captures, culls and edits (!!) video for you has caught my eye. Benjamin Button is a hands-free and kid-friendly “button” that clips to your child’s (or your) clothing and records up to 3 hours of video. When you plug it in to recharge, it automatically processes the video and uses a combination of face detection, sound recognition, and human activity to analyze the footage and edit it into a movie for your enjoyment. You can also use a mobile app to manually select footage that you want to be included, so you get some control over the results.
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We haven’t had a chance to try it out yet, but I sure am curious. Will this be the gadget that gives me family videos more recent than 2010? Or that gets me into a video or two, rather than just my disembodied voice saying, ‘No, come back here’? Do you think I can clip it onto one of my children’s jackets without them noticing so that I can find out who really started the argument? Or will this go the way of the pet’s view cameras that were so popular a few years ago? (Turns out my dogs don’t do anything very interesting when I’m not there.)
Press Release
Benjamin Button – The World’s First Smart Wearable Camcorder for Kids
It’s never been easier to capture and store childhood memories.
CHICAGO, June 12, 2017 – Many parents have long struggled to balance the chaos of life with kids and recording all of the precious moments that happen along the way. Especially those that children will most likely not remember, but play a significant role in forming their lives and personalities (from 0 to 4 years old, children have a very limited memory). Thanks to the team at Benjamin Button, now there’s an easy solution. They’ve just launched the first smart wearable camera in the shape of a button created for kids and parents alike.
Parents simply clip Benjamin Button to their child’s clothing and they will get authentic, natural, and loveable full HD content from their child’s perspective with up to three hours of recording time. Based on sound recognition, face recognition and action recognition parents will automatically be given only the best parts of the day that have been captured with Benjamin. There’s the option to hand choose the best moments after they have happened, too. The button is large enough to eliminate any risk of choking, has advanced encryption privacy security, no WiFi or Bluetooth radiation, and is made of safe BPA-free plastic.
“We wanted to create a product that made it possible for parents to be free to focus on enjoying time together with their child, rather than operating a camera. That’s exactly what Benjamin Button does! Our long term goal is to create an ecosystem around family memories and create a revolution in parenting by allowing parents and their kids to spend time together and capture and keep memories for future generations to enjoy. Through the memories of the youngest family members we are creating a world where we are bringing families together in this fast and demanding era,” said Dominik Orfanus, CEO of Benjamin Button.
Benjamin Button’s Specifications
- 140 degree diagonal FOV aspherical lens
- 1080/25 fps full HD recording (video), time-lapse mode, advanced video enhancement features
- 16 GB storage
- Custom made Li-pol battery
- Automatic turn on and turn off system
- 3hrs of video recording
- Water, dust and kids-proof (IP 66/67)
- USB type C connector
- 264 video encoding
- 2 inch (53 mm) in diameter and 0.79 (20 mm) inch in thickness
- Weight of 65 g (2.3 Oz) = 4 packs of chewing gum
- No active WiFi or Bluetooth
About the Benjamin Button Team
The Benjamin Button team is led by serial entrepreneur and former journalist, Dominik Orfanus. Together with Andrej Spanik (CTO), co-founder of the tech company and serial entrepreneur too, they are now focused on bringing the final hardware prototype to life. The girl power behind Benjamin Button: Michala Lipkova is in charge of UX and product design, together with Boris Salapa, the Head of Marketing and Ivan Za?ko, the crowdfunding manager, they have launched a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign.
The company is taking pre-orders for Benjamin Button exclusively through Kickstarter until July 3, 2017. The campaign, where early adopters can still take advantage of the special Kickstarter only discounted prices, was funded in under four hours.
Kickstarter page: http://kck.st/2rajbZB
For additional information about Benjamin Button please visit our website, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)