CES: Zoom’s Q3 Serves Up Meaty Sound With A Side Of Video

LAS VEGAS — Most video camera makers concentrate on the video, then poke one (or if you’re really lucky, two) tiny pinholes in it to record sound through. Yeah, like that’s enough.

So Zoom’s approach is to take a honking great, smurf-colored stereo microphone and stick a vidcam, screen and controls on it.

While sound from the mic seemed pretty darn impressive, the $250 Q3’s video capability is bare-bones, recording in 640×480 at 30 fps (but in a Mac-friendly Quicktime format) with only a 2x digital zoom.

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But that’s the idea — to put sound first. The guys at the Zoom booth said the idea behind the Q3 was to give sound recordings a little video accompaniment, like say as a way to record what guitar chords sound like for a music student, along with accompanying video of technique.

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About the author

When he was eight, Eli Milchman came home from frolicking in the Veld one day and was given an Atari 400. Since then, his fascination with technology has made him an intrepid early adopter of whatever charming new contraption crosses his path — which explains why he's Cult of Mac's technology editor. He calls San Francisco home, where he works as a journalist and photographer. Eli has contributed to the pages of Wired.com and BIKE Magazine, among others. Hang with him on Twitter.

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Posted in CES 2010, News |

http://blog.argentinaslovenia.com/ Carlitos
As a musician and happy owner of Zoom’s H2 great digital recorder, I can say this sounds like a great idea. Every time I record myself playing with a video camera, the sound’s utter crap, and a device such as this one would actually make perfect sense.
Makes you think why didn’t they think of this first, hm?
porkchop1234
You know what would be a better idea? Actually having a great picture accompanied with great sound. Guess that will never come. Oh well I guess the old adage is true there’s a sucker born every minute.
250 bucks for a fancy mic with a low end camera on it pffttttt yeah ok.