Combining a pair of binoculars with a digital camera is a brilliant idea with endless possibilities, with useful applications from birdwatchers documenting their greatest "catches" to parents zooming in on their kids on the playing field. Unfortunately, Bushnell’s Imageview digital binoculars, which integrate digital imaging into a pair of 10x25 binoculars, may be ahead of their time.

The image quality of the binoculars isn’t a problem, as they employ clear optics that allow for sharp focusing at the fixed 10x zoom level. Build quality also is good, with thick rubber coating on the sides to ensure a good grip and fold-down rubber eyecups to accommodate eyeglass wearers. The small 25mm objective lenses, however, don’t provide substantial light-gathering but do keep the design as small and light as possible

The built-in camera will be the real problem for most users. It uses a low-resolution CCD that snaps pictures at a fixed resolution of 640 x 480, which is fine for e-mail but not adequate for making prints. To make matters worse, most of the shots we took were grainy, with lots of compression artifacts and subpar color.

If you can live with those limitations, the camera does have the benefits of ease of use and plenty of image-storaging capacity. With 8 MB of built-in memory, we snapped nearly 150 pictures before connecting the camera to a PC. No image preview is available, but a basic black-and-white LCD display on top of the camera tells you how many pictures you’ve snapped and the selected mode.

With a better digital camera and removable memory slots, this idea of a high-quality camera-binocular hybrid could realize its full potential. However, the image quality compromises imposed by the Imageview will be too much for many to bear, regardless of the low price.--T. Byrl Baker

Pros:

• Compact binoculars
• Camera is easy to use and doesn’t require two hands
• Stores nearly 150 pictures in internal memory

Cons:

• Low picture quality
• No direct image preview or management
• 25mm objective lens means you need a lot of light to get the most out of the binoculars