Check out “Hover Camera” from Zero Zero Robotics, a China-based robotics company pioneering the future of smart flying robotics. It’s exactly as the name suggests; a camera that hovers when you release it. If you’re thinking “Well it’s just a drone with a camera” then you’re sort of right and sort of wrong all at the same time.
It’s quite the innovation and the simple marketing helps to put a well-deserved “spin” on the actual product itself. Hover Camera is autonomous and Zero Zero Robotics has managed to replace the traditional gimbal. It comes with a sh*tload of features like a carbon fibre casing and electronic image stabilisation (EIS). It’s portable (small enough to fit in a purse) and super-easy to use. You simply power it on, flip it open, hold it anywhere, and release it.
There’s no doubt you’ll like what it can do. Vloggers like Casey Neistat will love it. Outdoorsy/adventurous people will want to do more outdoorsy things. If Hover Camera is at the right price point, say under $500, I anticipate it will sell and sell well. Consider it the next big thing in photography, filmmaking, and vlogging. Hover Camera weighs less than 250 grams, so there’s no need to register with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
Although Zero Zero Robotics highlights some of Hover Cam’s primary features like throw and balance, 13MP and 4K video, and auto-follow, it says nothing about the low light performance. Let’s assume like everything else (gadgets) on the market, lighting is mediocre, so well-lit environments will always work best.
If the company’s managed to create a better gimbal than let’s say DJI (makers of UAVs) then I could see them getting a lot of licensing deals from drone companies.
Zero Zero Robotics was started by Meng Qiu Wang who is Founder and CEO with a team of 80+ employees with a diverse academic background. They’re aiming to set new standards in aero-robotics and the Hover Cam is their flagship product that was successfully funded at $25 million. Visit their website and check out Hover Cam for yourself. You might add it to your Christmas wish-list.
phresh ideas + designs® 
Ok, I’m in love with this “thingy” 🙂 Thanks for sharing this 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yeah, no problem. Just had a look at your blog and read through your About section. Interesting approach to get people’s attention on ecology. Very cool.
LikeLiked by 1 person
There is too much video in the world, and too many people want MY attention to watch THEIR stuff.
Nope. Not happening. I need to be able to skim – you can’t skim video.
Writing is for me – I can decide if I want to spend time by a quick look at the beginning and end, and an assessment of the style. Maybe I’m too old, but people can’t spend all their time being interrupted – we’ll never get anything done.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Alicia, that’s an interesting perspective on video content versus writing. I hadn’t stopped to look at it like that before.
And here I was thinking most people were more interested in watching a video than reading actual words like we did pre-2006.
I still prefer leafing through a book than watching a video.
LikeLike
Video requires you process input linearly, in someone else’s preferred speed, and usually makes skipping ahead while still getting the gist of it impossible.
Reading can be non-linear. Read at your own pace. Read the beginning, skip to the end; if you like it fill in the middle some, if not, at least you know what happened.
And the video folk feel they have to fill the beginning of the videos with stuff preparing you to see the video, and the end with credits.
Rarely can I stand to watch a whole video, even if it’s only a couple of minutes long.
It’s a rare videographer who provides you with less than you’d like to see, on purpose. Most often they are reluctant to throw away any of their precious footage, so they show you the whole thing, tedious frame by tedious frame.
And let us not even talk of the hideous horror of video (and audio) that starts playing the minute you hit a site, and you can’t find where to turn it off!
I have very limited mental energy – I don’t waste it like that.
I use AdBlocker to block ads, too – most of them have gone video-intensive (to cut through the chatter we’re surrounded with), and I cannot take things bouncing around in my peripheral vision.
Books are much better – you’re in charge.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I like that analysis of video vs books. You’re absolutely correct.
YouTube nowadays is cluttered with millions of budding vloggers and filmmakers. Out of all that noise, I probably subscribe to no more than 10 who make incredible content that you’ll actually take the time to sit down and watch. Casey Neistat is one such filmmaker and vlogger.
Books do have the edge though in terms of informing and educating those who turn their pages. I should definitely give Ad Blocker a try; there’s nothing I hate more than the sounds you can never find on a site, like you just mentioned.
I see that you’re an author. Extremely impressive creating that many stories. Kudos. I wish I could get back to writing like that.
LikeLike
AS I ask everyone, What kind of books do you like to read?
LikeLike
Growing up I read a lot of fiction. In my twenties it turned into reading mystery novels. Now that I’m in my 30s, I read a lot of biographies and autobiographies and inspirational writings and anything I can learn from.
Right now I’m reading “So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love” by Cal Newport.
LikeLike
I’ve stayed mostly on the fiction side; I seem to have little interest (except for occasional binges) in non-fiction.
My goal has always been to improve my own writing to the level of the classics I was reading. Craft is a very important part of that. The art is extra; I hope I have it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sounds like you’ve spent a great deal of your time working on your craft. What’s been your most successful story?
LikeLike
Well, since I’ve only published one, it’s both the most and the least successful.
Too Late, which is on my blog and on Wattpad, is a short story, prequel to Pride’s Children, and it’s logged 63.6K Wattpad reads. I’m trying to get the energy to put it on Amazon, but will leave it where it is for free. It’s short and gives you an idea of how one of my main characters got that way.
It took an inordinate amount of time, and many consultations with an Irish friend.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ll have a read. I’ve published a book via Amazon on entrepreneurship. I think I sold ONE copy! Hahaha
The biggest challenge uploading your work to Amazon is just spending the time to do the required formatting based on their standards. In actuality it will probably take some man hours, but it’s not a painstaking process.
LikeLike
The uploading went smoothly. The process of formatting fiction for ebook and print was more complicated, but aided by Scrivener, TextWrangler, and Word – I wrote about the process on my blog as I figured it out.
For fiction, if you want an ebook with no right margin indents (the one thing I couldn’t make it do), you can do it directly: create an epub that’s perfect, and upload the epub plus a cover pdf, and you’re done.
In fact, I’m going to do that myself for a couple of things I want to publish. As soon as I create the covers. Short stories – unless they are illustrated works for children – are probably not worth the effort of turning into print books.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Those are some great tips. From time to time I interview creative people and publish them on my blog. Would you be interested in being interviewed in a quick Q & A format?
Here’s one of my previous interviews – https://phreshid.com/2016/01/15/phresh-q-a-series-17-questions-with-copywriter-branding-expert-alison-hess/
LikeLiked by 1 person