I’ve been playing with an Eye-Fi that I got from a SocialSpark opportunity and today before I left work I took a bunch of Macro shots of my Transformers. When I got home they automatically uploaded to my computer and to my Picasa Account. I’m trying to use Picasa more now along with Shuttercal, Zooomr and Flickr. There will be many more of them soon that I’ll be uploading to.
This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of EyeFi. All opinions are 100% mine.
I am reviewing an Eye-Fi Share Video 4GB SD card which was given to me through a SocialSpark Opportunity. I used the card in my Powershot Canon SD800is Digital Elph and my Nikon D80 DSLR. I was so excited to be a part of this opportunity to review this product because it is one that I have contemplated purchasing many times in the past. I’d seen people at parties online who took photos that were automatically posted to Flickr and tagged with custom tags. This was all done wirelessly. I thought to myself, this would be perfect for me. I could take shots of Eva and have them automatically post to Kodak so that my in-laws could see the photos immediately and I wouldn’t have to slog through uploading a ton of photos (if you haven’t noticed I take a TON of photos!). Here is a simple explanation of what the card can do for you.
The choices for uploading photos number 28 online services and the option to have the photos automatically uploaded to your PC as well. The one major drawback for me is that you can only choose ONE location to post to at a time. I want check boxes not radio buttons on my uploading options. I want to upload to multiple sites at once and I thought that was what this card could do for me. You can enter your information for every single one of those 28 locations but only ONE can be chosen to actually upload to. This is something that I find lacking in the interface and would like for Eye-Fi to make it possible for you to upload to multiple platforms at one time. The same holds true for video uploading.
For Video, you have 8 online options and the option to have the video automatically upload to your computer. I would like to see the addition of video sharing sites like Vimeo and Viddler. I would like the ability to upload to multiple sites as I stated previously.
Setup of the card was very simple. There is a special USB reader for the Eye-Fi and when you connect this and the Eye-Fi to your computer you can make specific settings to the physical card. Here is an example of one of the setup screens. I installed the software on a few computers and had no troubles whatsoever with the software installation.
One of the most important features of an Eye-Fi card, for me, was geotagging. I wanted a card with geotagging included but I did not get that card. So, I paid $14.99 out of pocket to get that feature added to the card. You can add geotagging and waypoint access to the cards by buying keys online through Eye-Fi.
I have to say, the geotagging is not good. I had a few images geotagged automatically but they were mostly around my house and in my local area. I took photos in Walpole, NH, Bellows Falls, VT, Providence, RI and Canton, MA. The only images that were geotagged were the ones I took at home and some images that I took in NH somehow got tagged with my home area when they wireless uploaded. I was not impressed with the geotagging and regret buying it. That and only a few photo sharing sites are supporting Eye-Fi’s geotaggin option and the biggie, Flickr is not. I took a look at the Eye-Fi Forums for an answer to the geotagging issues. Almost every topic in geotagging was from people who were disappointed in it. Had I known about this issue I would not have purchased the geotagging option. I probably would have spent the money instead on the Waypoint access so I could upload photos from any Waypoint location.
The geotagging issue and the inability to upload to multiple sites aside, the card performed pretty well overall. I did have a crazy late night snafu with it last night where it crashed my router because it went back through every photo in my camera and tried to upload them again. I didn’t think that the images and videos had uploaded but this morning when I signed into Picasa there they were. I chose the Picasa option because Picasa was one of the sites that could take the geotagging information. Again you can only upload to ONE photo sharing site at a time.
You have many options for each of the sites that you can upload to. For example, you can make and image private when you upload it. You can set certain tags to automatically be added to the photo and you can even set custom folders. Say you are having a New Years Eve party and you want to have a real time slideshow happening. You could use your Eye-Fi card in your camera, take a bunch of shots and upload them to Flickr and have them all in one Set or have a specific keyword automatically attached to each image and video. Throughout the night as you take photos and videos they are wirelessly uploaded to Flickr, automatically tagged with keywords and put into a folder on your computer ready for your friends and family to enjoy. On the flip side if you have a wild and crazy New Year’s Eve party you might want to mark all images private and then discard the embarrassing ones when you sober up.
I think the best use of this card for me would be to give it to my Mom. The reason I say this is that I know that she has photos on her camera from six months ago. She wants to see them on her computer but that means that I have to upload them for her. This is not hard to do but it is always needed at the very last minute. With the Eye-Fi card she can shoot all the photos she wants and then come home, turn the camera on and the images will wirelessly upload to her computer. They will be put into folders by date for organizing later.
Make sure you adjust the power saving features of your cameras so that you uploads are not interrupted. I think that was my issue last night. Luckily Eye-Fi has great info on how to make the setting changes on your cameras.
I think this card would have also been great for taking photos of Eva in her first year. I meticulously took photos of her every single day, uploaded the images from the card and put them into dated folders. I can pretty much say that if I had used this card for that specific purpose I could have saved HOURS of time for other things… like playing with Eva. The card has some Good and Not-So-Good points to it, so to break this down for you:
The Good
The Not-So-Good
Would you like to Win an Eye-Fi?
Through BenSpark.com and a few other blogs (I haven’t read everyone else’ reviews yet, wanted to keep my experience totally fresh and unbiased for you) 12 Eye-Fi cards are being given away. Complete contest rules are here: http://izea.com/contest-rules-regulations/eyefi-contest-official-rules/
Contest Entry is simple.
1.) Leave a comment on this post. (Please follow my comment policy because I do moderate for spam and I like conversation and real comments).
2.) Tweeting a message containing the hashtag “#eye-fi” with a link back to this blog post.
The Contest begins at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (“EST”) on November 17, 2009 and ends at 11:59 p.m. EST on December 13, 2009 (the “Contest Period”). Entries will not be acknowledged.
