Our phones are tiny, and cute, and portable – designed to be carried in our hands. But sometimes that works to their disadvantage, like when you’re trying to take a steady photo or video. Selfie poles and tripods made specially for filming videos on iPads have been the object of both lust and derision in the past few years, in part because people look a bit silly operating them. Now Motrr, a builder of “creative tools for mobile devices,” has teamed up with videoconferencing company Rango and introduced Galileo, an elegant remotely-controlled device for Apple devices or GoPro that is controlled by an app – and is a little less intimidating than a drone.
Galileo, which originated on Kickstarter, isn’t just the in-your-face video conferencing you’re used to doing, with all the awkwardness of asking your friends to lift and adjust their laptops so you can see better. It’s truly a way to show conversation partners your surroundings. Via Bluetooth (which pairs by twisting the device) or an Internet connection, you can control the orientation of the remote camera with a simple tap or swipe on the live video from your iOS device or web browser. Both the dock itself and the docked iPhone can reposition accordingly up to 360 degrees. Imagine video chatting with your friends and being able to tilt your head and move around, with the phone in its dock as your proxy.
