The Obsbot Tiny 4K camera packaging consists of a box within a box within a box. I wish I’d kept the box from my original OBSBOT to compare but I’m fairly sure it wasn’t this elaborate.
The outer packaging is a simple cardboard container marked Obsbot. Within that, the official box – white with red top and bottom – within that an all-red OBSBOT box – and within that, the carry/storage case – a lovely grey cloth-like material. Got to hand it to their marketing department – this catches the attention.
So the bit I don’t remember in the original Obsbot Tiny is the black case. Nope – definitely not or I’d have taken a photo for the blog. I tend not to keep packaging as I don’t have endless space in my office but I’m keeping this black container.
So hsving raved about the original Obsbot Tiny, what is there to say about the new 4K? Well, it’s 4K! As for the Tiny range – well, after years (decades) of being a Logitech fan I almost immediately passed on my Loitech in favour of the Obsbot Tiny which RIGHT NOW is sitting, upside down on the shelf above my desk. I’ve a quality deak mixer and microphone and honestly, most of the time I just use the internal microphone in the Obsbot Tiny.
So as you might imagine I have high hopes for this new model. As you see above, the original despite coming with it’s own fixings, is simply attached to a bolt through the shelf above my office desk and faces me at all times except when I want some privacy to doze off, at which times I simply turn the camera to point at the base, disabling output.
See the pretty green indicator – that tells you if the AI tracking is following your hand movements, indicating you want to zoom the camera in our out – or tell if to track face movement. I use those features – I have to say I was never convinced about that – ok in an office on your own but if you’re in a conference, moving your hand around to convince the camera to perform an action – will others in the conference think you have some age-related illness? Depends on your age I guess.
Enough woffle – I like Obsbot Tiny so much, it is and has been for a while my ONLY web cam – so what will I do with Obsbot 4K?
The simple answer is – I just played a very dangerous game and without checking the manual, unscrewed the original after disconnecting the USB-C lead and plugged in the new Obsbot 4K. I went into OBS Studio on my PC (nothing to do with OBSBOT incidentally) and opened that up. No camera… I checked settings and OBSBOT was selected – I checked the options and there was a NEW option – Obsbot 4K – just like magic.
As it’s early in the morning I simply went off to put on some warm clothing (mid-April – Southern Spain – it’s supposed to be toasty warm – but not today – In my original blog on the Obsbot Tiny – the weather was much nicer – way too cold for that t-shirt right now) and as I came back into the office, the new Obsbot was tracking me effortlessly around the room – I’d not set ANYTHING UP, no proper lighting – nothing …. it just worked. The two shots above were implemented simply by sticking my hand in the air with my index finger up at which point the Obsbot smoothly zoomed in and out. I like this. As for head tracking, this next snap below is taken from a completely different angle – the camera just automatically moved around to follow me.
Now, rather than show you much more of my amateur attempts at photography, check out the Obsbot link here – they have a neat video of using the optional remote control (possibly a safer bet in meetings than hand gestures?) – I’ve only SECONDS ago asked them if they can send me the remote – if they do I’ll include moer info on it in here – meanwhile – it looks a bit like an Android TV BOX remote control.
So, lots of adventures ahead with my new 4K – there’s a manual here… and now I’m off to check my firmware and PC APP versions so I can try out the new portrait mode (that is new). I just turned on the original PC TinyCam APP and went to upgrades and a few minutes later after some blue, green and yellow flashing, my new 4K OBSBOT camera was updated to the latest firmware. Below – the official mounting kit and USB-C lead. There’s also a USB lead with a tiny power-only connector “UNC 1/4-20 interface” – not entirely sure what that’s for – I’m sure it’ll be in the multi-lingual manual somewhere. The 4K has dual microphones incidentally.
As for zoom, I just noticed that there’s hardly any discernable loss of quality when zooming in – I guess that’s the point of the extra resolution.
Did I mention HDR mode? It’s a bit subtle but it works – I’ll have to try some outdoor photography first sunny day we get.
Focus – various modes all of which you can turn off. On neither this nor the original Tiny have I seen the need to touch the focus control.
For the new portrait mode, I refer you back to my new favourite OBS Studio PC APP (free incidentally). The camera has to reboot to switch into portrait mode and I had to restart OBS Studio (possibly not necessary but I’m no expert yet). But hopefully you see the point, the camera is now in portrait mode which gives me room for some extra imagery (picture in picture – which you can do in OBS Studio with ease) – I can see a use for that.
Oh YES, this is FUN. I just added in the original Tiny which of course only does landscape – moving the new 4K to the TOP (in a small window) in OBS Studio (again I stress, free and nothing to do with the cameras) then moving my blog link to the top of that lot.
