Hover Camera:Your new selfie stick?

If you are a selfie addict, this gadget should be in your arsenal of selfie accessories. Introducing the Hover Camera Drone.

Toss that selfie stick away. You can now get a flying selfie drone that will buzz around and take your photos for you. The Hover Camera from ZeroZero Robotics folds up small enough to fit in your backpack, so you can take it along on all your selfie adventures. Don’t worry, you don’t need to send your phone flying to use the Hover Camera ; it already comes with a built-in camera.

The drone is designed to fly around autonomously, following you and filming you from the air. It’s like a very fancy airborne selfie stick. Set it to automatically track your face or body, or control it like a regular drone using an app.

One big disadvantage to the Hover Camera is that it lacks a gimbal. Instead, it uses electronic image stabilization(EIS) to counter shake in photos. But EIS is only available while taking photos and cannot ensure that video shooting goes smoothly and stably.

In addition, the Hover Camera has a maximum hovering time of up to 10 minutes without wind. Though you get two batteries in the package, 20 minutes is not a lot of time to enjoy taking your selfies while hanging out. Excluding the time it takes to strike a pose or mug for the camera, you’re not going to get that many shots off before your battery is out of juice.

What makes it intriguing despite them is the clever folding design. A cage-like structure protects fingers from the propellers. You can even grab it right out of the air when you’re done filming.

It’s on sale now, but you may balk at the $599 price, which is a lot to ask for a personal selfie drone. You can get a very capable DJI Phantom 3 Standard $499 for less, after all. But if you love capturing your own image, and want to put an aerial spin on your selfies, the Hover Camera looks like a promising option for narcissists with deep pockets.

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RIP selfie stick, Hello Hover Camera

The Hover Camera is a very simple-to-use drone dedicated to taking selfies pictures or videos.

Beijing start-up company Zero Zero Robotics basically combined two of the most defining technological trends of the 2010s – the selfie stick and the drone (a flying robot) – into one totally futuristic and niche product: the Hover Camera. As the name suggests, it is intended primarily to hover although it may also move.

• Safe – because the four brushless motors (which Zero Zero apparently developed itself), reside within a carbon-fibre cage. It would be next-to-impossible to clip your fingers with a prop, unless you have impossibly tiny fingers.
• Portable – because when it’s folded it measures 182x132x33mm (or a little more than 7.17” x 5.2” x 1.3”) and fits in a small pouch you could throw in your purse or clip on your belt loop.
• Foldable – because, well, it folds.
• Easy-to-use – Yup. Just power it up, place it where you’d like it to Hover, and let go. The Hover Camera, in what appears almost a magical stunt, remains wherever you place it. It features a downward-facing camera and sonar, so it calculates and maintains its position.

The Hover Camera is controlled by an iOS or Android app, so anyone with a smartphone can connect via WiFi and easily learn to control this quad (though the WiFi range is limited to a maximum of 20 metres, according to the company’s specifications).

What’s cool, is that the company has built in a few smart features.

The Hover Camera can follow you, or orbit. It has face-tracking and body tracking – and can even spin in one spot to capture a panorama shot.

As for the image? It’s captured in 13 megapixels via a 1/3.06” CMOS sensor. The maximum image size is 4208×3120 pixels with a field-of-view of 28mm. What’s more, it’s capable of recording 4k, 1080p, and 720p – all at 30 fps. You can control the pitch of the camera angle from -90 degrees (pointing straight down) to +30 degrees (which would give you an up-the nose angle if hovering close to you at chest height).

On paper, all that looks pretty solid. Throw in its ability to just hang there wherever you put it, and it’s pretty impressive. The company home page includes some choice quotes from reviews, including:

“It allows you to grab it and reposition it like a floating tripod” – c|net

“You can grab hold (of) it any way you want without getting cut by the propellers.” – engadget

And, from Dronelife.com: “You’re going to want one.”

On that last point, we’d say – Maybe. And maybe not.

The Hover Camera retails for $599 US. If the Hover Camera shot great video and had an extended range and long flight times, we’d say “Awesome – sign us up!” Unfortunately, however, the Hover Camera is severely limited in those three areas.

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