1. A portable device including a microphone and a radio transceiver, and additionally comprising: an image sensor that senses imagery; a human visual system processing module, selected from the group consisting of a white balance correction module, a gamma correction module, an edge enhancement module, and a lossy image compression module; a machine vision processing module, selected from the group consisting of a fast Fourier transform module, an edge detection module, a pattern recognition module, a Fourier-Meltin transformer, a texture classifier, and a robust local feature detector, the machine vision processing module outputting processed data derived from the sensed imagery from the image sensor; and an interconnection arrangement; wherein the machine vision processing module employs processing circuitry integrated on a common substrate with the image sensor, and wherein the interconnection arrangement couples image data from the image sensor to the machine vision processing module without passing through the human visual system processing module; the portable device thereby being configured so that the processed data output by the machine vision processing module is available for subsequent processing for the purpose of testing for characteristics indicating that the chance the image depicts a certain class of information is greater than a random chance, without such data having been impaired for such purpose by having been processed by the human visual system processing module.