Paul Ridden

About this time last year, Samsung announced three new Wi-Fi-packing additions to its NX mirrorless camera range. Since then, smartphone cameras have come on in leaps and bounds – increasing the megapixel count to within spitting distance of dedicated cameras, while also bumping up overall image quality. Rather than square up to the ubiquitous smartphone, like Samsung's Galaxy Camera for instance, the new NX2000 reaches out and taps mobile devices on the shoulder to offer a friendly greeting. Thanks to the inclusion of near field communication (NFC), that quick tap is all that's needed to set up direct wireless communication for instant photo sharing and file backup.  Read More

Multi-tone performance pickup specialist AweSome Musical Instruments has unveiled what's claimed to be the first commercially available 3D-printed guitar made in the US. Touted as virtually impossible to break (though the same can't be said for the supplied light gauge strings), the Les Paul-style AWE-3DG also sports a bank of rather interesting pickup selectors that open the door to otherwise hidden coil combinations for up to 76 different analog tones.  Read More

If you need to cut across town, sliding behind the wheel of your car is not always the most practical or quickest way to get from train station to office, office to gym, or gym to juice bar. While public transport serves most inner cities well, the thought of zipping quietly and effortlessly through the thronging masses is one that has great appeal. If you can just collapse your vehicle down to a fraction of its size at the end of your journey, all the better. Such is the case with a soon-to-be-released three-wheeled, stand-and-ride electric scooter named MUVe, which transforms into a suitcase-sized trolley between rides.  Read More

Researchers from the University of Maryland have built a new micro air vehicle dubbed Robo Raven that's such a convincing flyer, it's been attacked by a local hawk during testing. Though numerous other robotic birds have successfully taken to the skies in recent years, including Festo's visually stunning SmartBird, this featherless mechanical marvel is capable of impressive complex aerobatic maneuvers thanks to completely programmable wings that can flap independently of each other.  Read More

Los Angeles industrial designer and keen guitarist Mark Andersen says that close examination of playing patterns has revealed that the current knob/switch setup on most electric guitars results in "conflicting motion paths" when the player needs to tweak the tone or volume, or select a different pickup. His answer is to replace the pots and switches with a pair of touch panels on the pick guard, to convert your Strat-shaped axe into a Touchmark Guitar.  Read More

While splitting a keyboard into two distinct zones may well make for more comfortable typing, especially for touch typists like myself, you still need to reach out to the side to grab your mouse and confirm onscreen actions. The Combimouse addresses this by having the right arm of the divided keyboard also serve as an optical mouse.  Read More

Val Kolton's V-MODA announced a new addition to its stylish range of headphones in October 2012 which, by the time of actual release in mid-December, had managed to attract a good many positive comments from the critics and enthusiasts fortunate enough to get an early listen. The Crossfade M-100s were developed in collaboration with over 200 audiophiles, editors, artists, DJs and Grammy-winning musicians ... and it shows. Gizmag has spent the last few weeks with our ears snuggled up to the 50 mm drivers to find out what all the fuss is about.  Read More

Developers, makers, and hobbyists looking for a beefier alternative to Gizmag favorite the Raspberry Pi will be delighted to learn that BeagleBoard.org has taken the wraps off a 1 GHz ARM-based board named the BeagleBone Black. Though it may look like a slightly more expensive outlay, its manufacturer says that by providing everything needed for display, keyboard and network connectivity right out of the box, the Black provides "a lower total cost of ownership than the nearest competitor."  Read More

Marshall first dipped its toes into the headphone market with the excellent Major on-ear headphones and Minor in-ear monitors launched in 2010. The iconic brand has now announced its first over-ear model, the Marshall Monitor, which allows users to choose between two different listening experiences.  Read More