HTC is not a company unfamiliar with making quirky smartphone accessories. While we wait for it to jump on the smartwatch bandwagon, it seems the company's working on a different sort of wearable device to augment its series of phones: a GoPro-like rugged camera. Bloomberg's Tim Culpan reports that HTC is planning a "tube-shaped" 16-megapixel camera with a wide-angle lens that would connect directly to your Android or iOS smartphone via Bluetooth and Wi-Fi.

While that sounds more like Sony's QX series of smart lenses, Culpan suggests it would be more of a GoPro competitor — meaning an emphasis on video capture and ease of use. Still, you don't need 16 megapixels just to shoot video and this could turn out to be HTC's solution to the one pervasive flaw in its flagship One handsets: the mediocre built-in camera. By introducing a separate and much better camera module, HTC could both find a new market for its wares and enhance the stuff it already has on sale.

Invites for an HTC event dubbed "Double Exposure" went out earlier this week, inviting press to meet with the company on October 8th. The event's name hints at a focus on imaging, so it may well mark the launch of this new camera from HTC.