In 2010, JVC released a world first camcorder with built-in Bluetooth Wireless Technology, GZ-HM550. After the announcement at CES in last January, GZ-HM550 is posted in the Internet, magazines and other media with expectations. However, don’t you think that the word "Bluetooth" is consistently heard in this few years?
Lately Bluetooth technology became popular being seen embedded in mobile phones and PCs. On the other hand, there are full of question marks as of what kind of technology is it, or what can it do combining with a camcorder.
So, this time we made an interview with one of our engineers, Mr. Kunio Otsuka who played a direct role of the GZ-HM550′s development.
Question 1. To begin with, please tell us what kind of technology "Bluetooth Wireless Technology" is.
There is an association called Bluetooth SIG (Bluetooth Special Interest Group) founded in 1998. And in 2000, the first product with Bluetooth technology is introduced to the market. As you can see, this technology has a history for more than 10 years. Please let me point out the basic specification of Bluetooth Technology.
#1 the communication distance is approx. 10 meters with no obstructions (class 2),
#2 the communication speed is max. 3Mbps,
and #3 the most distinctive characteristic is the low-power consumption comparing to other wireless communication technologies.
At first, Bluetooth technology was equipped with printers and PCs. Around 2004 and 2005, there was an explosive spread because of the advent of mobile phones with built-in Bluetooth technology. For the last few years, mobile phones rank the top of registered products certified by Bluetooth SIG. It is reported that over 800 million units are shipped as of 2007 and at this time more than 1.5 billion units are hitting the market. Nowadays, headsets which work together with mobile phones are also very popular.
About 10 thousand companies are the member of Bluetooth SIG and of course, JVC is a member of the association.
In the ten years of the Bluetooth technology history, since both shipping quantity and the number of the members are growing rapidly in the past several years, it seems that Bluetooth is a "hot" technology in the market.
Question 2. Then how did you come up with the idea to equip Bluetooth technology to Everio. Was there a trigger?
The time we came up with this idea and started the development date back two years or more. I’m sure that it is similar in the product planning and development process, we were having internal discussions of the opportunities of use and the complaints or the things to improve on those occasions. There are some ideas which are still under study, so I can’t tell you all specifically but the one came up was the demand that people want to keep the location data when you shoot a video while traveling. At that time, we first studied the GPS function to meet this request. And we actually proposed to our staff of the new function but the commercialization of product was rejected. They told us that if it only records the location data, it doesn’t make sense or it doesn’t worth much. Still we constantly studied many other possibilities. So, the time we set our eyes on Bluetooth technology was when we were hitting the wall.
It’s true that Bluetooth technology is not useful with just one product. Bluetooth technology becomes convenient only after collaborating with other Bluetooth products. But this main feature of Bluetooth technology became a big benefit to expand the possibility of camcorder usage. Also previously explained, the low-power consumption of Bluetooth was efficient to equip to a portable device.
To answer your question, if I need to point one out as a trigger then it might be the development failure of built-in GPS product.
This is the way we decided to adopt Bluetooth technology, but our real fight began here.
We had long brainstorming sessions to come up with actual feature ideas. That was the most suffering part.
Continuing to next week, Mr. Otsuka will tell us untold stories behind development of GZ-HM550 and comments of the expanded possibilities of Bluetooth technology and camcorders from the engineer’s point of view.
RSS FEED