Swivl is Your Personal Cameraman

http://vimeo.com/31713891
And guess who the director is, you! Swivl is a mount for your pocket camera or iPhone that takes direction from a tracker attached to your subject, and it can tilt or pan to stay with you. Videomaker first looked at this product when it was in it's prototype stage and needed funding.

After a lot of crowdfunding with IndieGoGo the project has become a marketable product and was a Videomaker Spotlight Award winner from International CES 2012. The Swivl promotes mobility and playfulness by keeping you in the frame that you define, even if you run circles around it. Sporting 360 degree horizontal tracking and 25 degrees on the vertical axis, there is little that Swivl won't catch. The smooth movement of the tilt can be locked since it tends to move up and down with the tracker's movement. The tracker also doubles as a wireless mic, which should really open up possibilities for one person crews or vloggers.

You may be 32 feet away doing something as simple as checking your snail mail or working on a training montage with the hero ducking branches and running between trees and it can be tracked. There is compatibility with Android phones that are .4-inches or less than 11mm, as well as standard tripods. The weight limit is 6 oz. and your time limit is four hours with AA batteries, or not with the wall charger. It is likely that your recording time will be completely dependent on your camera's battery, since the tracking remote runs on a pair of AAA batteries for about 10 hours. Swivl is packaged with the tracking marker, tripod mount, lanyard, batteries and a Micro USB cable.

Shipping begins by this spring from the folks at Satarii Inc. The audio capabilities are only available with the app, and the wall charger is sold separately, but for a final price of $159, you couldn't find a better hire.

Jennifer O'Rourke
Jennifer O'Rourke
Jennifer O’Rourke is an Emmy award-winning videographer & editor.

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