Eye-Fi’s wireless cards are awesome. They allow you to automatically beam photos to your computer over Wi-Fi, and in the absence of a wireless network, to blast them directly to any device that can connect to Wi-Fi. Toshiba’s FlashAir card does the same, but can both send and receive data wirelessly. If the technology catches on and there are two compliant devices — cameras for example — in range, they’ll be able to exchange data as well.
The FlashAir is a logical evolution of wireless SD. The question is what exactly would you use it for? Toshiba clearly envisions people sharing photos between cameras, but that’s actually not the best idea. Pro photographers will tell you that shooting photos with multiple cameras on one card can lead to corrupt files. Wireless hard drives already exist. Perhaps these cards could be useful as more tablets with expandable memory are released. We’ve got some time to figure it out: Toshiba has only demoed a 8GB version, pricing and availability are TBA. [Toshiba]
TSH
Friday, September 2, 2011 at 12:16 PMI really can’t think of a good use for these.
Joshua
Friday, September 2, 2011 at 2:42 PMI can think of several. One in particular is that I would be able to transfer underwater photos from my wet camera to my tablet and vice-versa.
This is in contrast to drying off my camera, opening up the compartment and then taking out the SD card with my fingernail and then placing the SD card in my tablet.
BETLOG
Sunday, September 4, 2011 at 2:22 PMWell firstly theres less cords to wrangle, and things like what Joshua said.
However for me it’s mostly exciting because when data can be transferred almost directly to the cloud via an intermediary device like a phone, from pretty much anywhere… all of a sudden photography, observation and journalism take a quantum leap.
Gone will be the days when ripping out your film, smashing/sequestering your camera, or even hassling the photographer will be useful to a would-be assailant.
I have been waiting for this sort of technology to mature ever since I first saw my first live TV broadcast van.
Two-way sounds good, but I’d want the option to not have the input part..just because.