I caught an advert on Instagram for the Pivo Pod. The quick description is the Pivo is a device with a rotatable base for your cell phone. Its purpose is to shoot video with your phone and as you move about, the device will track you and keep you in frame. Since I am something of a gadget-freak with visions of videos for this site, I simply had to buy one.
In the box
- The Pivo Pod
- Remote control
- A Smart Mount
- USB charging cable (No charge block)
- Instruction Guide
- A handy carrying case
There is a companion app (Pivo Play, available for iPhone or Android) you need to download and set up on your phone. And you will be using that app for recording video. The setup was super easy and the instructions super intuitive so I was up and running in minutes. Nice…
Pros
The things I really like about this are;
- The app has many modes including Capture, multi-stream, pano, and Many Me, to name a few.
- Set up was literally 2 minutes and very simple to do
- The app works such that if you step away from or closer to the device, the camera will auto-zoom in and out to keep your face in frame.
- The device will also pan, left and right, following you as you move about during your recording. This is especially handy if you don’t have a camera person to follow you around.
- Videos are automatically saved to the Pivo Play app, your local pictures app, or to your Google Photos if you use that instead. No special setup for this.
Cons:
The truth is, there is only one thing I don’t like. Sadly, unless it has a remedy, it’s a deal-breaker. I’m addressing the fact that as the device rotates, the sound of it doing so comes through in the audio portion of the video playback.
The End Result
I contacted customer support to see if there may be some thing that could be done about the mechanical noise coming through the audio portion of the video. They asked me to send them my order info as well as a sample recording that would show the problem. That’s the video above. Feel free to play it.
Their reply was;
Hello Karl,
This is Sherwin and I’m helping my colleague with her tickets.
Apologies for the late response. Since the device is within 30 days from the date of purchase, Amazon will be able to process your request. With this, we recommend to coordinate with them.
Please let us know if you have other questions. Thank you.
Best,
Sherwin
Customer Success Specialist
pivo.ai
That was all. Without any other response, I can only surmise they aren’t at all moved that one of their products performs such that it’s a deal-breaker. To me, this says only one thing… they do not easily stand behind their product. Which is too bad because I like the idea of it. So I was left with only one thing to do. I returned it.
Chalk this one up to a good idea executed poorly.