I should really start this post with a confession: I LOVE gadgets. I love, literally love, photo gadgets and video gadgets and audio gadgets. I love playing with them and learning how to improve my AV tech skills. I have a non-stop problem, however, which is that I ran out of models pretty early on. That’s not a confession. That’s more like a sad, sad commentary.
About a year ago, I found a model who didn’t sprint like a startled deer every time I pulled out the camera AND who was perfectly willing to pose endlessly when asked. That model, of course, was me. As it turns out, I can always be willing to improve my photo techniques AND learn how to pose. This willingness is not without difficulty however: it’s really hard to be in front of the camera and behind it at the same time.
Thankfully I love – as you may recall – gadgets. And I’m not afraid to test them. This is good because as many times as I ask my husband to take a photo (ever seen Husbands of Instagram?), it can be challenging to convey what I am looking for while also learning how to improve lighting, composition, and get a decent photo all at the same time.
Last night, in honour of my recent birthday and my love of all of the above, I decided to buy a Pivo. I figure it’s not just a cool toy, but it also may save my marriage. It’s got a bunch of features I consider essential if I really want to up my selfie game, plus a whole lot of options if I want to really even get into the vlogger game. One of the reasons I bought my gimbal was for a feature call the “follow me” function, which, for the record, is the COOLEST THING ever. I love my gimbal and I use it daily. But then this ad for a Pivo kept popping up in my Facebook ads. Eventually I decided to have a look at the gadget and see what it was all about.
Which I did. But then I decided I didn’t like the price. So that was that. Back to happily playing with my gimbal.
Last night I saw the ad again and thought, “What the heck?” and so I bought it. I didn’t just buy the original Pivo though. I bought the new not-even-released-yet version. In a nutshell, this means I have to exercise patience. That’s not my strong suit. Not only has it not been released and won’t be for a few weeks, even once it makes it into the mail, I’ll have to wait for our COVID-closed international border to let it into Canada and then get it to my door. Patience and I are not good friends. This stinks.
So why did I buy it?
There were a two features that appealed to me and they were the entire reason why I bought the Pivo pod. The first was a very cool feature called “Many Me.” I could easily imagine making a new banner or a new header for social media using this. It’s very cool. The second is the “Smart Tracking” feature that I love in my gimbal where it is called “follow me.” In order to not have my husband living his life as my personal photographer, something he is oddly resistant to do, I need a tool that does more or less the same thing.
As an added benefit: you get a personal photographer and videographer who isn’t bothered by social distancing or COVID-19. That’s sort of important at this time in history.
Here is where it gets different from my gimbal: I also need to be able to put this down and have it keep working. The Pivo has both a remote AND voice control. And unlike my gimbal, the Pivo is intended to be put down and then you pose (or ham it up) to the Pivo as if it’s your photographer.
I’m pretty excited about it and while I wish this were a product review, in reality, I’m still waiting for it to arrive. Well, or even ship. Either way: I’m super excited and I can’t wait to use it. Hopefully it will get here in time for the beaches to re-open.
If you want your own Pivo and are totally exited, here’s that link again: Pivo.
PS: If yours arrives before mine, tell me what you think of it in the comments below!
(Full disclosure: the Pivo link takes you to my affiliate page. It won’t cost you anything but since I’m all excited about this AND it’s a new start up company, I want to promote it.)