[jyl]

Apparently in 1999-2002 a company called Silicon Film/Imagek tried to do this. Perhaps technology just wasn't up to the task. They got as far as a 10 MP device but it had a sub-size sensor and an external unit attached to the bottom of the camera. Since then, full frame sensors have been developed, NAND flash has dropped probably 30x in price and near that in size, and batteries are much smaller and better.