Alt.CES – EyeClops digital optics toys

Computers & Mobile Craft & Design Fun & Games Technology
Alt.CES – EyeClops digital optics toys

EyeClops Butterfly TV.jpg

The Jakks Pacific EyeClops brand made waves back around the 2007 holiday season with their super magnifying camera toy, which set a successful design strategy they’ve since followed up on with their Night Vision 2.0 and Mini Projector toys: Take a professional piece of digital optics and make a functional $50 toy version.

I bought both their active night vision and video projector toys for my nephews this last Xmas. The older of the two, Michael, agreed to review them for us:

EyeClops Night Vision 2.0 Infrared Stealth Binoculars

eyeclops-night-vision-2.jpg

When I saw this, my first impression was that it was probably a fake. I thought it wouldn’t actually be much better than my eyes most of the time. I was wrong. The infra-red system does work. This toy has two settings for the infra-red light. The low setting emits no visible light, and detected a person wearing blue jeans and a dark green shirt about thirty feet away. On high, it emits some dark red light and managed to pick up the same person 77 feet away, which was better than I could do with my eyes. The image is displayed on a screen inside the object, which can be set to display black-and-white or black-and-green. Unfortunately, the detail isn’t too great. Faraway things appear only as white outlines, and it requires some playing with the focus for closer stuff. It handles bright lights well, although it does tend to be washed out in bright areas. Overall, it’s a pretty good toy.


EyeClops Mini Projector

eyeclops-projector.jpg

This is a pretty cool little device. It’s about the right size to fit in the palm of my hand, and yet it projects an image up to 60″. Understandably, the speakers are rather small. It comes with an AC adaptor and a battery base. The package says the batteries last for 270 hours, but I haven’t used it that long so I don’t know. I tested it in the shadow of our TV in a lighted room during the daytime, and it clearly projected an approximately 20″ image. Understandably, it needs a dark place to be able to project a 60″ image, but it’s fairly bright for such a small projector. It accepts RCA audio and video input, and features a headphone port. It’s a good little device to take with you on trips.

[Thanks, Michael!]

12 thoughts on “Alt.CES – EyeClops digital optics toys

  1. Beardy says:

    270 hours? …er, that would be 270 MINUTES!

    270 hours would be better but the batteries aren’t so portable

    ;P

    [m]

  2. Anonymous says:

    I’ve read some reviews and all agree that the problem with this projector is the low light (other than the 320×280 resolution)
    If you can get it for 30 bucks though, swapping the led for a more powerful one might be worth a try.
    Has anybody got it open? Is it possible to change the led?

  3. Paul Richards says:

    In a very dark room, results are quite excellent.
    How long will the light last? How can it be replaced? I’m also interested if anyone else has got it open.

  4. S. T. says:

    The projectors are on clearance at Target for $25 if you can find them.

    1. rovert says:

      Unless you ran across the smaller projector for $25, this one has been and still is $99.00

      1. Sean Michael Ragan says:

        I paid $49.95 for it new, from Amazon, a couple of weeks before this post went up.

Comments are closed.

Discuss this article with the rest of the community on our Discord server!
Tagged

I am descended from 5,000 generations of tool-using primates. Also, I went to college and stuff. I am a long-time contributor to MAKE magazine and makezine.com. My work has also appeared in ReadyMade, c't – Magazin für Computertechnik, and The Wall Street Journal.

View more articles by Sean Michael Ragan

ADVERTISEMENT

Maker Faire Bay Area 2023 - Mare Island, CA

Escape to an island of imagination + innovation as Maker Faire Bay Area returns for its 15th iteration!

Buy Tickets today! SAVE 15% and lock-in your preferred date(s).

FEEDBACK