Looxcie LX1 Wearable Bluetooth Camcorder, iPhone and Android Compatible

This product is a great idea. A small wearable camera. Who wouldn't want that?

Well, unfortunately, there are a number of flaws with this device.

For one, the quality is not very good. 15 frames per second and low resolution. This means your videos are not going to look as good as the example videos. Also, the camera has a somewhat narrow field of vision. It would be much better if it taped a wider angle, because you are not going to be that good at aiming the thing. (You can kinda see the effect in their sample video on YouTube where the guy proposes to his girlfriend and video tapes mostly her chest... it's involuntarily funny).

Also, somehow the camera would need a serious image stabilizer. I have no idea how that would work with a camera like that, but the reality is that people move their heads a lot and very fast and with the low frame rate and resolution, that is a problem to begin with, and even if that was better, people watching your videos are still going to get disoriented or worse, unless you seriously restrict your movements.

The device also doesn't seem to be very sturdy. My ear-plug part broke off the first day. Granted, I wore it under an ice hockey helmet (and Looxcie even says it isn't meant to be a ruggedized product). But it's not like I took a shot to the head. It was just pushing it under a relatively tight helmet that did it, disappointingly.

The worst aspect of this product however is what must go down as one of the oddest technical and business decisions of all time: The camera requires a smart phone to operate. You can now use an Android phone as well as an iPhone. That is mandatory. I have no idea why. Granted, it is a cute to use the phone display as a view finder. Kudos for that. It is also nifty to be able to quickly upload 30 second snippets of video to all kinds of sites. I like that as well and can think of plenty of uses for that. But I can also think of plenty of scenarios where I need more. And you don't get that.

You have to use the phone to do all video editing. The camera has some proprietary internal storage mechanism you can't get to unless you turn your buffered video into snippets of up to 30 minutes of video. So you use your phone to scan back and forth in videos to cut them. If you have ever used the iPhone video player, you know what a pain that is. Now when you do that, the video is still stored on the camera.

And grabbing these video segments is SLOW. I think what happens is that the phone grabs video segments from the camera, puts them together into a video file, and then puts it back onto the camera. Or maybe it just somehow instructs the camera to do this. Either way, it takes forever. (You can also download videos to your phone, once they are saved as snippets. That is even slower. Downloading 5 minutes of video to my iPhone took 15 minutes or so... and then it crashed the phone). Which is no big surprise really, because neither the camera nor a smart phone has enough power to do a lot of video editing. And your segments are limited to 30 minutes max.

And if it is more than a minute or 2, it is too large to just upload to sites like YouTube of Facebook. So what you will end up doing is this: You have the camera recording (which is a bit fidgety, but OK). Then, you use your phone to try to edit the segment you want. You then wait for that to save (like 10 minutes or more). Then, you repeat the same thing with your next 30 minutes. Except it is almost impossible to find the right stitching points. If you want all 5 hours of video, you need to make at least 10 segments. More likely 15, since you will have trouble with the overlap. You do the math on how long that takes. Then, once you are done, you plug the USB cable into your computer and download the videos. Well, usually it takes a few tries for a Windows 7 machine to recognize the camera as a storage device. But then you can download your video.

Why the heck they would not use a PC to allow for editing and view finding is completely beyond me. They could have used PC Bluetooth. They could have used the USB cable. They could have created a powerful app that grabs everything on the camera and then you could have done advanced editing easily on the PC. Or they could have leveraged existing video editing software. And processing videos that are more than 30 minutes would not have been a problem at all!

Oh, and you better not change your phone. Because if you change your phone (which most people... especially gadget freaks that are likely to buy this camera... do often) then your camera may be useless. Or who knows? What if Looxcie's software (which only runs with some difficulty on the iPhone now it seems) won't be upgraded to the next version of the OS? Then you are stuck with a camera that can only record 30 second segments of video, because that is all it can do without a phone.

This whole decision so boggles my mind, that I would actually like to meet the person who made it, because you really don't often get the opportunity to meet people that think and reason quite so differently from the rest of us. It would be a meeting I would never forget, I am sure ;-)

Anyway: I considered giving this product only 2 stars. But on the other hand, it is not all that expensive. And it is kinda nifty in what it does. If only they hap PC software, it would be much better. The overall concept is awesome. I will certainly buy a newer one once they have HD and higher frame rates and such. But for now, it is just a nifty gadget that has potential but doesn't really quite do what you are hoping for.

Hey, if you're expecting HD quality video on a device you wear over your ear...well, you're kinda out of luck at the moment (though I'm sure that's coming in the not too distant future). But this device actually records better video than I expected. Of course, maybe I just had low expectations. I think really though, I just had realistic expectations and the Looxcie has met or exceeded those. I was thrilled to see this device in the pages of Popular Science a couple months ago, then bummed to find out that it was not available for the iPhone at that time. Luckily they got the iPhone version ready before the Christmas season and my wife hit a home run by making sure it was under the tree in time.

I've only been using the Looxcie for one day so far (since Christmas), but I've recorded a bunch of clips and also downloaded the entire video buffer (a welcome new feature) to my Mac (a very simple process) and the video looked quite good. Yeah, it's a little grainy, but not bad. It's certainly better than my ability to remember every detail of every moment. Also, it looks like they have a new feature coming to iPhones that adds 30fps at 480 resolution, so the quality will be even better (granted with a shorter record time).

I've never seen a device like this before, so I'm willing to live with it not quite being everything to everyone at this point. I'm sure it will get better and even at its current stage I'd say it's pretty darn good. The biggest downside for me is that it seem quite big compared to a standard bluetooth headset. I was concerned that I would get a lot of weird looks and stares from people. But, I quickly realized that most people either were not concerned with what I was wearing on my ear or just thought it was an old school blue tooth headset. I do wish it was a bit smaller though...but I'm sure that will come in time as well. Overall I'm quite happy with the device so far.

Buy Looxcie LX1 Wearable Bluetooth Camcorder, iPhone and Android Compatible Now

I tend to loose my bluetooth headsets a lot, and since I do a lot of rock climbing I thought I would give the Looxcie a shot (and hopefully since it's a little larger then the normal bluetooth maybe I won't loose this one).

It's been great! It has an excellent earpiece. Pairing it with my Droid was really easy. I've taken several video's while climbing and they've all turned out with really good quality. The Looxcie has been really reliable for me. I also like the fact that it's there when I need it. Several times I've been walking with the dogs or out on the point and have been able to record on the fly. It's made for a lot of fun later on when sharing stories with folks. The Looxcie is really worth the price I highly suggest if your going to look at a bluetooth earpiece give this a try. You won't be disappointed.

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I was so excited when I first saw this product since I've been looking for something like it for so long! I've seen other similar products, but they are so bulky and not at all practical. Looxcie is immediately different in that it is so easy to handle. But Looxcie isn't just a camera, it's a bluetooth headset too. This thing is unbelievable! I was able to make calls and answer incoming calls. And as if that wasn't enough, this is almost a "too good to be true" product given its great price point and ease of installation. If you have an iPhone or Android, you can download it from the control panel where you usually pair bluetooth-devices. Be sure to download the FREE apps from Appstore or Android market (just run the app it's that easy!) There's two apps LooxcieMoments and LooxcieCam. I liked LooxcieMoments best as it records constantly in the background when you wear the device and put it in record mode. With one press of a button you save the last 30 seconds. I used this over and over when my 8 year old was trying to explain to his big sister what Viagra (based on a commercial he had seen). It was hilarious and I never would have been able to do the story justice without the Looxcie!!! And speaking of kids, you can also edit the clips on the phone and share them clips can be up to 30 minutes long. Although the quality isn't as good as video, you need to know that this product isn't meant to be used that way. It's basically a "re-do" resource that is able to capture the times when you should have had the video camera on! Given that, the quality of the Looxcie-footage is perfect.

Looxie is extremely easy to use. I can't overstate this since I am not particularly good at this type of thing I'm a stay at home that just wanted to capture moments from my kids' lives! I did need some tech support because, as I said I'm not good at this type of thing, and I can't tell you how great they were. They were courteous, didn't talk down to me and clearly explained the fix (I made an error in use).

Go get the Looxcie and start having fun! At $199, there is no reason not to!!!

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I've been looking for a wearable cam for some time. When I saw Looxcie I wanted one immediately, it's not just a cam, as an added bonus it's also a bluetooth headset with which you can make calls and answer incoming calls. But of course, the main thing is the cam, I've not seen a wearable cam at this price level anywhere. In fact, I've not seen a wearable cam at all being this easy to handle. It's super easy to install and use. Pair it with your Iphone or Android-phone from the control panel where you usually pair bluetooth-devices. Download the LooxcieMoments-app from Appstore or Android market respectively run the app and you're good to go. By the way, you don't have to install any app or pair it, you can use the device anyway to record stuff. But you won't be able to use phone as a viewfinder and other features the apps contain. But you can still transfer the clips using USB. But of course, you should install the app, they're free. There's two apps, LooxcieMoments and LooxcieCam. I prefer the first one, it records constantly in the background when you wear the device and put it in record mode. With one press of a button you save the last 30 seconds. It's perfect when the kids does funny stuff or similar. You can also edit clips on the phone and share them, those clips can be up to 30 minutes long.

I've seen other people here comment on the video quality. This is not a camcorder, for that I use a slightly larger memory-card based device that shoots 1080p videos and has lots of zoom-capabilities. This thing is not for that, this thing captures all those moments when videocameras should have been on but never is. Considering this, the quality of the Looxcie-footage is perfect, compared to not having had it at all.

Finally, the product is easy to use and comes in a neat package and usually it's very self explanatory to use it. But if you by any chance need to get in touch with product support it's one of the best I've been involved with ever. This will be the best 199 bucks you'll spend in a long time!