When Apple designed the iPad, they opted for simplicity and omitted things like a USB port or memory card slots. This made it more tedious for photographers to transfer a large number of photographs onto their iPads, since the Camera Connection Kit needed for USB and SD Card support comes in two separate dongles. Luckily, there’s a made-in-China knockoff that can ease a little of the pain — the 3-in-1 iPad Camera Connection Kit combines the two dongles into one nicely designed apparatus. Available in both black and white, it comes with a USB port, a SD Card slot, and a Micro SD Card slot. Pick one up over at the M.I.C Gadget store for $29.90.

3-in-1 iPad Camera Connection Kit (via Engadget)

Want something fancy to prop up your growing collection of photography books? These snazzy vintage camera bookends sell for $50 on Amazon, and could also make a fun gift for your favorite photography-enthusiast bookworm.

Vintage Camera Bookends (via MCP Actions)

Have numerous SD cards you need to access at once? The Elecom MR-C27 SD card reader is a four-slot card reader that allows you to do just that. It allows you to access up to 64GB of data, and looks like a cute little toaster connected to your computer via USB. It’ll be available for ¥3,980 (~$48) starting mid-December in Japan.

Elecom MR-C27 SD Card Reader (via Wired)

Photographer Adam Elmakias created these geeky lens gel bracelets to help photo-enthusiasts show off their love of photography. They come in a range of focal lengths, and cost $10 apiece over in his online store.

Here’s a selection of photos showing people sporting these bracelets.

Lens Bracelets (via Gizmodo)

Carry around your business cards, cash and/or plastic in style with this nifty retro camera business card case by Etsy seller Coolbeans717. Each handmade case takes 5 days to make and costs $13.50.

Mini Retro Camera Business Card Gadget Case (via KEH Camera Blog)

Goodwill has an online auction site called shopgoodwill, and categories in the Cameras & Camcorders section include film cameras, lenses and accessories, and vintage cameras. It’s not nearly as well-known as popular auction sites (e.g. eBay), so you might be able to find a good deal on camera gear!

(via A Photography Blog)

Amazon is selling the 10 megapixel Panasonic DMC-F2K Lumix compact camera for $69 today on its deal of the day Gold Box page. If you’re looking for a cheap camera for yourself or as a gift for the upcoming Christmas season, you might want to take a look.

Deal of the Day: Panasonic Lumix DMC-F2 Digital Camera (via The Online Photographer)

There’s no app for this: Etsy seller Erin Paysse designed this pinhole camera out of an iPhone box. It’s been done before with an iPod box, but Paysse added a clean, retro touch to the camera. She’s selling the camera for $80, as well as some prints produced by the camera for $25.

Check out her store to see more creative pinhole cameras made out of  boxes and books.

(via Boing Boing)

The graduating class of the BA photography program at the University College Falmouth needed to raise money for their end of the year show, so they decided to make and sell a cookbook. What’s neat is that each of the recipes was submitted by a famous contemporary photographer.

The resulting full color 100-page book is titled “Say Cheese?“, and features recipes from such notable photographers as Elina Brotherus, Richard Misrach, Alec Soth, Rineke Dijkstra, Tierney Gearon, Joachim Schmidt, Martin Parr, and Susan Derges.

If ordering from within the UK, the price is £9.95 (~$15) with shipping and handling included, and if you’re outside, the price is £14.95 (~$23).

Given how low the price is, this might make a great photography gift or collectible item. Imagine if we had a cookbook with recipes from famous historical photographers!

Say Cheese? (via PDNPulse)

If you’ve ever edited your Flickr photographs using the default image editor provided by Flickr, then you’ve used the web-based image editing software developed by Picnik.

Whenever you click the “Edit Photo” button above one of your photographs, it opens up the image in the Picnik editor.

Well, Picnik announced today on its blog that it has been acquired by Google. There aren’t many details available regarding the acquisition itself, but the web is abuzz now with speculation as to what Flickr will do.

Thomas Hawk suggests today’s purchase may signal that Google is trying to dethrone Flickr as image-sharing king of the web:

What else makes me think this? Google Buzz. While I consider Flickr superior in a lot of ways to Picasa today, the biggest advantage that Flickr has always held over their competitors is how strong a grip they’ve had on the social aspect of photo sharing. But now that Buzz has arrived on the scene (and your Buzz photos go into Picasa albums by default by the way), it would appear that Google finally has a viable social network to compete with Flickr’s own internal social network inside of Flickr. By combining the social power of buzz, with an enhanced version of Picasa, Google could mount a formidable competing offering to Yahoo’s Flickr.

It’s interesting that Flickr let Picnik slip into Google’s hands after partnering with them for so long.

What do you think today’s news means for Google’s Picasa and for Yahoo’s Flickr?