I don't understand how this works. If it's a transparent display that just passes through light and adds some overlay information (like a viewfinder on d/SLR cameras of the old), then doesn't the frame change completely depending on the distance you're holding the device at in relation to your face?
It can't be meant to be used with your arm fully outstretched, because that would be an impractically narrow field of view. So how do you "calibrate" your stance to make the capture match the FOV of the glass rectangle you're looking through?
I think the idea is that the display kinda represents the shot, but not well, but if you cared you wouldn’t be shooting with a $29 camera. I mean, it takes 1920x1080 pics, don’t get too picky there, Ansley Adams. :-)
But I agree with you, I don’t see how the “viewfinder” is all that useful, other than “nifty!”.
Maybe it does measure the distance to your face to work out where to show the viewfinder rectangle...
It's $29, this is a fun gimmick to take pictures of your friends doing bullshit this summer. It's obviously far worse than your phone, the point is that it's fun.
Not only that, but slight changes to the angle you're holding it will result in dramatically different photo angles, even though you're always seeing the same thing.
For a near flat $29 MSRP camera I'm not sure I could come up with better way to have an overlaid viewfinder. The screen itself even looks to be a cheap segmented display, not a grid of pixels.
If you care those things mess up your framing of the shot then you probably don't want a flat $29 camera.