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Goggles with a third eye

Rip-Curl Third Eye Goggle-Camera

Candace Lombardi
In a software-driven world, it's easy to forget about the nuts and bolts. Whether it's cars, robots, personal gadgetry or industrial machines, Candace Lombardi examines the moving parts that keep our world rotating. A journalist who divides her time between the United States and the United Kingdom, Lombardi has written about technology for the sites of The New York Times, CNET, USA Today, MSN, ZDNet, Silicon.com, and GameSpot. She is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not a current employee of CNET.
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Candace Lombardi

Rip-Curl has come out with a goggle-camera combo for filming while you swim...sort of.

The Third Eye Goggle-Camera holds a small minicam that plugs into the analog input of a camcorder. It weighs about 60 grams, according to Rip-Curl specs, and is encased in shock-resistant aluminum and rubber.

As Gizmowatch points out, the casing is waterproof to 1 meter deep, but with the necessity for a camcorder connection, it's meant more for shallow water filming. You will still need your Fantasea casings for deep-sea photography or video recording.

The minicam has a high-resolution Sony CCD sensor, anti-fog screen, and interchangeable Essilor-BNL lenses for four different focus modes. Rip-Curl, however, does not specify what those modes actually are, or the megapixels of the CCD chip. The Third-Eye Goggle-Camera is available from Suneyes for about $702, and includes connection leads, microphone, battery housing, and a backpack to hold an accompanying camcorder.