From my review of the Canon HF20 and WP-V1 underwater camcorder set on Gizmodo:

But once I got underwater and watched many of the divers struggling with their rigs, catching protuberances on errant kelp fronds, I felt a little better about wielding this simple Canon setup. As a point-and-shoot (and shoot and shoot) piece of equipment, the whole rig is simple, capable, durable, and—especially compared to similar underwater gear of just a couple years back—cheap enough that it won’t be a tragedy when it gets lost at sea. The street price of the HF20 (an AVCHD camcorder with 32GB of flash memory) is $800; the WP-V1 can be found for around $400.

Enjoy at full 1080p resolution…if you dare.

Jefferson Robbins has produced an excellent short video showing the parallels between Mad Men‘s retro visual styles and some of its great influences—specifically A. Hitchcock. Viva la dolly! [via Jason Kottke]

Uncorrected, fresh from the Canon HF20 oven. There will be lots of pretty stuff to come post-edit, but I wanted to get this shot up as soon as I could. It was a lucky bit of peripheral vision that found this octopus out in the open.

The iPhone remains one of my favorite cameras to use. “QuadCamera” by Takayuki Fukatsu combines the high saturation and low resolution of cheap plastic cameras with the fast snaps of a modern camera. For portraits it is a special treat, capturing up to eight frames over a variable time period; waving around the iPhone in a person’s face almost always elicits a smile.

Now when I pick up a traditional camera I wonder, Why can’t I load special photography apps onto this?

Music by the wonderful OFFICE.