By Evan Ackerman

This little piece of spy equipment is something that could possibly make that Bond James Bond guy a little jealous, if his watches weren’t consistently endowed with badass weaponry. If you’re more the passive surveillance type as opposed to the lasers and sonic disintegrators and garrote wires and kicking ass and ordering pretentious drinks and getting the girl type, then I pity you, but the Secret Agent Camcorder Watch may be right up your nonthreatening alley. It has a pinhole camera hidden in the number 2 on the face of the watch, with a little mic on the side. The camera captures 352 x 288 full color AVIs for up to 2 hours nonstop before the battery goes dead, and a USB port on the side of the watch allows convenient offloads. The camera can also take VGA (640 x 480) still pics, and the 2 gigs of onboard memory can be used as data storage. And it even works as a watch!

The trick to this is going to be getting the camera and the microphone pointing in a relevant direction without snapping your wrist in half, and I imagine it takes quite a bit of practice to pull it off while simultaneously not looking like someone trying to slyly point their wrist at something.

The Secret Agent Camcorder Watch costs a nickle under $200.

[ BrickHouse Security ] VIA [ Neatorama ]

By Evan Ackerman

It’s been a long time coming, but finally, there is a physical trophy that those of us who are awesome at fantasy gaming can proudly display in our homes. This rug is the pelt of, um, one of these things (maybe), except of the vegetarian cave dwelling variety without sharp teeth or eyes. A terrifying and foul beast, it does 2d4 bite damage and has a cold resistance of 5, but is vulnerable to fire and piercing weapons. If you manage to kill one, you can skin it, but it costs 1200 gold pieces to turn it into a +3 rug of impressing your dorky friends.

Of course, this monster skin is just as fake as whatever pride we fantasy gamers take at our imaginary accomplishments. It’s hand made out of felted wool and polymer clay by Joshua Ben Longo. The only real bit is the price: a monster skin rug costs $1200 to $2500, depending on size.

[ Longoland ] VIA [ Neatorama ]

By Andrew Liszewski

eBay seller ‘fordelite_76‘ currently has an auction running for this custom Wii gun they created, which they refer to as being “***** AWESOME ******”. You just can’t argue with that many asterisks.

Given the gun has a starting bid of just $20, it’s safe to say that’s not a real Desert Eagle, not to mention the fact that it comes with an optional orange ‘safety tip’ for those times when you’re playing Wii and absent-mindedly wander into the nearest convenience store looking for a snack. But I have to give fordelite_76 credit for a gun mod that looks about a million times cooler than the ‘official’ Wii gun housings currently on the market.

[ NINTENDO Wii Gun CUSTOM DESERT EAGLE ] VIA [ GoNintendo ]

By David Ponce

Something’s got to be said about Twitter’s traction these days. Despite y’alls having RSS feeds, there’s really no point if you aren’t really reading them. So… for constant updates of our whereabouts at CES, and to get an opportunity to guide us live in our hunt for the perfect gadget, follow us on our Twitter feed. We’ll be updating with behind the scenes stuff that wouldn’t make an interesting or complete article.

[ OhGizmo's Twitter Feed ]

By Andrew Liszewski

The Wii Fit balance board provides a surprisingly fun ski experience in the comfort of your living room, but it’s got nothing on this SKIGYM simulator available from Pro-Idee. It was developed in Germany with ski instructors, sport scientists and even physical therapists to provide an accurate recreation of the motions used while skiing, and even appears to include a set of ski poles that somehow interface with the simulator.

The included software, Alpine Ski Racing 2007, is PC-only, so you’ll need to use a laptop or computer instead of a gaming console, but it comes complete with 32 different courses from 18 real life venues including Beaver Lake, Lake Louise and Chamonix. You also have your choice of 6 different disciplines including super G and slaloms, and the ability to adjust the difficulty level from junior to amateur to professional as you get better and better. At about $2,280 it’s considerably more expensive than Wii Fit, but I’d feel more comfortable tackling the real thing after practicing with this, than Nintendo’s offering.

[ SKIGYM Ski Simulator ] VIA [ Random Good Stuff ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Well, maybe flamethrower is a bit of a stretch, but for pyromaniacs on a budget this Pistolight, designed by Sooda Mayer, could provide a similar thrill the next time they’re disposing of an abandoned warehouse. The horizontal orientation of the lighter also apparently also makes it easier for regular folk to light candles, tea lights etc. I can’t find any pricing info, but I don’t expect them to cost much more than the lighter itself.

[ Pistolight ] VIA [ Nerd Approved ]

By Andrew Liszewski

More and more megapixels crammed into your digital camera also means you need more and more storage for those photos, particularly if you plan to be away from your computer for a while. Thankfully these portable external hard drive photo managers are the perfect tool to not only backup your vacation photos, but enjoy them as well. Digital Foci will be introducing their new Picture Porter 35 photo manager at CES next week, and in addition to a 160GB+ hard drive it features a 3.5 inch color LCD screen, an integrated card reader supporting CF, MMC, SD/HC, miniSD, Memory Stick, MS PRO, MS Duo, and xD-Picture cards, a USB host function allowing you to copy to or from another external hard drive and even the ability to output your shots to a TV or a projector.

And as DSLRs become more popular, I particularly like the fact that the Picture Porter 35 supports RAW images with the ability to view, zoom and even access their EXIF and histogram data. But like with most things announced around CES, the Picture Porter won’t be available until Summer of 2009, and the MSRP has yet to be determined.

[ PR - Digital Foci Picture Porter 35 ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Those old-timey phone handsets that have been retrofitted to connect to a modern cellphone are clever and all, but they’re not really that practical (or easy to carry) if you intend to use them away from a desk. But this mini version is. It connects to your cellphone just like a Bluetooth headset would, and instead of walking around talking into a tiny earpiece, you’ll be walking around talking into a tiny handset.

I guess I don’t really see the point of using this instead of just talking into your cellphone, though it is slightly smaller (depending on the phone you use) and is less likely to get pinched if you decided to talk to your friends while wandering down a dark alley at night. Thumbsupuk.com has ‘em for about $36, though I’m pretty sure they won’t just sell you a single unit.

[ Bluetooth Mini Phone ]

By Andrew Liszewski

Though we wouldn’t notice the hiccup in our timeline if they had, I suspect a group of futuristic space explorers have recently traveled back in time to our era in the hopes of rescuing a particular species that’s not only on the road to extinction, but also serves as an important plot point. But because we’ve yet to invent the necessary transparent aluminum they required, they had to improvise and reveal to 3M their secrets for making transparent duct tape instead. Which in my opinion, is a far more impressive innovation.

Thankfully this wonder material is now available to everyone with $4 in their pocket and the need to shortcut a home or automotive repair. While it’s not 100% transparent (yet!) 3M’s Transparent Duct Tape is far more subtle than the traditional shiny gray sheen of regular duct tape, which should help hide the fact that you never got around to properly re-attaching your car’s bumper.

[ Scotch Transparent High Performance Duct Tape ] VIA [ The Green Head ]