After rebranding itself as Snap, (Snapchat) has been calling itself a “camera company” for some time now. Although known for its impressive camera filters, Snap keeps releasing hardware that provides a superior augmented reality experience and although it may not generate a lot of revenue, it amazes the world with its technological aspects.
After coming up with the ‘Spectacles’ that aimed at capturing memories through lenses, Snap has now come up with a drone called ‘Pixy‘ which looks as cute as the name sounds. This was announced at the Snap Partner Summit. It is being described as a ‘pocket-sized’, light in weight (only weighs 101 grams) drone that takes a lift from your palm. On a fully charged Pixy, you can expect 5 to 8 flights ranging from 10 to twenty seconds. The light-weight design cannot encompass heavy batteries but you can buy additional batteries at $20.
The drone can follow you around and the videos or images that you capture from the device can be sent back to your Snap application. It takes off and lands on your palm and comes without a controller. It has six pre-programmed flight settings and stores footage directly in the Memories section of Snapchat. It doesn’t capture audio.
The area of drones is still pretty professional and using some even requires a permit. The available drones are heavy, have a complex use case, and are also expensive. With a view to making drones ‘fun’, Snap came up with Pixy. It will be available online in the U.S. and France for $230.
Pixy has its limitations, like the company’s advice is not to use it when it’s too windy or not to use it around water or reflective surfaces as the bottom camera that enables auto-flight can get confused. But, for a camera with this design the technology used is quite impressive. Users can choose how the drone will move around by various options available on the app. Some of these options include, hover, follow, circles, etc. The bottom camera will detect your movements to follow the instructions accordingly. When users find out that using Pixy is so easy, they are left with a feeling of amazement.
The CEO of Snap, Evan Spiegel’s interest in drones began in 2016 when he almost bought the drone company Zero Zero Company, but for several reasons, the deal didn’t go through. Now, finally, the CEO got the chance to start exploring the world of drones.
The biggest attraction of Pixy is its simplicity. The company is also not aiming to generate a lot of revenue from the product. The CEO said in an interview, “When we look at our approach to hardware, it’s really just about extending the core of what people are doing and love about Snapchat.”
At the Snap Partner Summit, the company also announced that it is rolling out a feature “Dress Up” that will enable users to browse through AR shopping filters and virtually try on clothes and accessories.
Featured Image Credits: Snap
