Train Me!

Although document cameras are easy to use, it is rare that teachers take advantage of some of the best and most powerful instructional features of these tools. One resource that many educators are unaware of is the training video library for your manufacturer’s document camera

Check these out (shown in alphabetical order):

       Elmo

       Hovercam

       Ken-A-Vision

Lumens Recordex

I am willing link to the training libraries of any vendor that contacts me, so manufacturers should never feel that I am playing favorites. Just send me your links to add here. For now, these are the only ones I could find.

New @ Recordex

There are a lot of new things happening in the world of document cameras and visualization tools, as evidenced in the first two major conferences of 2014 (FETC and TCEA).  In this post, I will highlight some of the ground-breaking trends being offered by the Recordex document camera company, who recently exhibited at TCEA and FETC.

Great educational technology always reduces steps, simplifies the work in front of us. Recordex has done this by implementing one-click integration of recorded videos (I call these ‘doc-casts’) using Screencast-O-Matic. This step simplifies the sharing of doc-casts with students, and is especially useful when sharing assessment recordings.

Also, Recordex upped their game by adding a seamless microscope adapter to their already excellent offering. This will certainly draw the attention of science educators.

A small adapter enables the Recordex to capture microscope images.

An example of the HD display available from microscope viewing.

Call Me Crisp

In this series I am hoping to cover three trends that I really like in the world of document cameras. I like that...

• document cameras are getting smaller 
• doc cams are turning colorful
• high-definition is providing a crisp viewing experience

Most visualizers now on the market are coming with high-definition cameras. The improvement is stark. The quality of images used for learning is nothing less than remarkable. 

Perhaps this trend helps explain some statements that were offered up in my last two visualizer presentations:

"These images are much nicer than what I get using the document camera I currently have in my classroom."

"This visualizer is better than any I have seen. What kind is it?"

These comments and questions really bring home the difference between the current generation of high-definition doc cams and the older generation of equipment that first made its way into schools some years ago. 

Perhaps this story will help clarify: I was recently using my visualizer as the primary camera for a live web conference with a colleague. We were doing some synchronous live conference testing using both Google+ Hangouts and the conferencing system built into our Canvas learning management system at the university. The colleague immediately noted the difference and remarked: "This was the best, most high-def image I  have ever seen on a live session." And she remarked that latency and frame rate were not adversely affected. I explained that the high-def visualizer was the reason why.

By the way, be forewarned that you might already own a High-Def visualizer, but have the settings pushed to a lower resolution. For example, once I was demonstrating a new HD Recordex document camera in a teacher workshop, and I thought something was wrong with the image quality. Actually, I had mistakenly set this HD visualizer to a lower resolution level. I called the company, and they immediately helped me catch my mistake. I had set it to one of the lower of six available resolution settings. 

My bad...

Grants, Contests, and More

It’s hard to muster your visual teaching kung fu without a document camera of your own! Use these opportunities to make things happen for your classroom. I will keep you posted as other companies step up to the plate for schools. Here are the only opportunities I can find for the Spring of 2013 to win or earn a document camera or other freebie for your school or classroom:

1. ELMO Lesson Idea Contest (Contest extended through the end of April)
2. Recordex Free Wireless Tablet Offer (for the cost of shipping, when you buy an entry-level document camera/one per school; use the promotion code SCE12 with any online retailer)
3. Samsung Superhero Competition (Deadlines May 31 and November 30)
4. Samsung Lesson Plan Contest (Deadline May 1)

For now, I want to give kudos to the companies above. But let’s just say that document camera companies should do much more than they are doing if they want to reach schools. Document camera companies should offer regular and creative contests, grants, and freebies to struggling schools. Once a school or department gets a successful implementation going, it is certain to spread. Sometimes they just need to prime the pump. 

2013 Super List

2013 List of Visualizer Manufacturers

Here’s my comprehensive list of all known visualizers on the market. (If you see one missing, please leave a comment below.) Use this list for purposes of product evaluation, comparing features, bidding, and identifying RFP resources for your classroom document camera needs:

Top Manufacturers in K-20 settings (in alphabetic order)

AVerInformation www.averusa.com/presentation

Elmo http://www.elmousa.com/

Ken-A-Vision http://ken-a-vision.com/cameras/groups/document-cameras-visualisers

Lumens http://www.myladibug.com/

Pathway Innovations      http://www.thehovercam.com

QOMO http://www.qomo.com/ProductList.aspx?CategoryID=1

Recordex http://recordexusa.com/PresentationSolutions.html

Samsung Techwin: http://www.samcam860.com/

Other Notable Manufacturers (in alphabetic order)

All in Learning ($25 dollar Doc Cam) www.allinlearning.com 
Buhl http://www.hamiltonbuhl.com/store/c/3161-Visual-Presenters.aspx

Califone http://www.califone.com/visual.php

Epson http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/jsp/EdProjectors/Home/ClassroomSolutions.do?BV_UseBVCookie=yes

iPevo http://www.ipevo.com/

Luna http://www.learningresources.com/product/luna--8482-+interactive+projection+camera.do?sortby=ourPicks&sortby=&

Optoma http://optomausa.com/products/detail/DC300

VidiFox http://www.vidifox.com/documentCamera.php

WolfVision http://www.wolfvision.com/visualizer/index.php/en

Simplicity

 One new finding I uncovered during my annual rounds at the ISTE educational conference was the arrival of Recordex _USA on the national document camera scene. This company features a new “SimplicityCam Series,” which starts at $225, yet sports many desirable features. Although some of these features are only available in Windows-compatible environments, I felt that the most intriguing  features (presented in order of uniqueness) were the following:

The Snapset Creator. This feature enables the teacher to put any number of pages down one at a time (for example, a 20-page science lab packet), hit a single button, and instantly generate a 20-page PDF  that can be emailed, posted online, or reused in the future. The Snapset Creator can also capture every document shown during an entire class and, at the end of the class, create a PDF of every document/object reviewed to send home to absent students.  I am certain educators will love this capability.  Here is a video demonstrating that feature.

Large Viewing Area. Two of the Simplicity models offer a large viewing area, with the ability to view up to 17.5” x 23.5” document or subject. This enables the teacher to easily display a children’s picture book, a large student project, over-sized realia, or even an outsized map.

AnnoZoom. You can annotate live images or videos, and then perform real-time zoom-in with your subject. The annotation remains.

Other positive features of this document camera include picture in picture video conferencing and an optional microscope adapter, just to name a few.

The Recordex simplicity series includes three doc cam models: the SC5i+, the SC5z, and the SC5z Duet. (A sample spec sheet is included here.) Besides its advantages for the regular classroom, this document camera offering goes a long way to support both the “flipped classroom” and the distance learning classroom. You can learn more about Recordex document camera options at this link.