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Uploading Photos and Video from my D90 via Eye-Fi and Clear

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I have been playing around with my Nikon D90 and the Eye-Fi SD Card that enables you to wirelessly transfer images from your digital camera to your computer and also post them to photo and video sharing sites via a Wi-Fi connection. A recent upgrade to the Eye-Fi now allows you to selectively upload images and video. Before the upgrade, all the images you took were automatically uploaded. This really limited the utility of the card. With the upgrade, you can now choose which images to upgrade simply by using the "protect" feature found on most digital cameras. The act of protecting an image initiates the upload process. This works great when I am home, but I was thinking it would be nice to be able to upload images as I took them. I have a Clear WiMax account and the folks at Clear have provided my school a wi-fi hotspot device (Clear Spot) that connects to the Clear WiMax network in Portland. The mobile hotspot allows you to connect to the web via Wi-Fi anywhere you get the Clear service. With a bit of tweaking of the hotspot I have added this network to the Eye-Fi SD card. While not as small as the recently announced MiFi Personal Hotspot, the Clear Spot device easily fits into a backpack of camera bag. (Another option to consider is if tethering the Eye-Fi card to my iPhone would work, but will need to wait and see how much AT&T is going to charge for that feature...)

I have my Eye-Fi Card configured to upload images and videos to my Flickr account. I have set it up so that the images are initially private. With my iPhone, I can review the images and edit titles and descriptions before making them publicly available.

WiPipe and Clear A Pretty Nice Father's Day in Portland... photo.jpg

Playing around with an Eye-Fi Card

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The recent update to the Eye-Fi SD card now allows you to upload "protected" photos rather than all that you take. A nice way to selectively upload to the web from your camera. The still and video above were taken on my D90. Basically all you do is take your photos, "protect" the ones you want to upload and that's it.

Playing around with WiMAX...

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Recently wireless internet access using the WiMAX protocol was rolled out in the Portland metro area. Clearwire has been marketing the service under the name Clear, as an alternative to cable and DSL. Using USB antenas and stand alone routers, Clear allows you to access the Internet wirelessly from just about anywhere in the Portland metro area. They are currently rolling this service out in other metropolitan areas around the US.

Recently Clear provided my school (Lewis Elementary) with two accounts. While there are not currently any Apple Mac drivers for the USB antenna, we are able to utilize the service using a WiMAX-equipped WiFi router (Clearspot) that connects to the Clear service. This portable hotspot is an interesting solution for providing Internet access for field trips and other times you need access while out in the field. For example on Earth Day we used the service to broadcast a tour of our school garden areas using Ustream. We have recently been experimenting with student use of iPod Touches and have used the portable hotspot to connect them to the the net. We have also use the hotspot to gain access at off site events and meetings where access is not readily available.

I plan on having my staff experiment more with this type of access and look forward to seeing what they come up with.

DSC_0014.JPG hotspot