Way-cool tool

Here’s something that fits everything multimedia into your back pocket with all the convenience of a notebook.
It’s the Nokia 93I: the latest generation of smartphone. I don’t have one, yet, but it looks impressive

The N93i has a screen that flips 160 degrees and gives you a viewfinder for a video camera with a Carl Zeiss lens, which is what comes with the Sony camcorders.

Pair it with a bluetooth wireless keyboard, and it looks like quite a powerful little phone. It even comes with mini-versions of Adobe’s PhotoShop and Premiere Elements video editing software.

Check out this demonstration.

Think of it: you’re first on the scene at a breaking news event. You take a short video clip, unfold the keyboard, bang out a brief description of what’s going on and you have it sent back to the newsroom and posted on the web, right out of your pocket.

Speaking of emptying your pocket, it retails for between $800 to $1,200. Now, when you think about it, that’s about what you’d pay for a new laptop, which doesn’t shoot video, take stills, or fit in your pocket.

And you really need a phone. This way you have only one thing to lose.

Not that most reporters can rush out and buy one. But the phones will get better, the prices might come down. You could save up and be the first one to have the cool new multimedia toy. Or it might even be worth pitching to the bosses, when they’re shopping for ways to equip reporters for multimedia.

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LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES: Angela Grant at News Videographer today posted critiques of three of my videos. This is a great site to get feedback to improve. Next time, I will shoot more close-ups.