Sep 24, 2015 | By Kira
Centuries from now, when alien-life reaches Earth and tries to piece together what made our society click in the year 2015, they’ll probably conclude that our two most prevalent forms of communication were the Selfie, and the Pet Photo. Seriously, scroll through Instagram on any given day, and you’ll find dozens of people posing in front of mirrors, pouting their lips, or snapping their cats or turtles in adorable positions. A third genre is on the cusp of emerging, however, and is poised to take over the previous two: it is the Pet Photo Selfie. That’s right, people posing with their pets.
Unfortunately, pets—and particularly dogs—are easily distracted, making it difficult to get a clear shot of them looking right at the camera. That’s where the Pooch Selfie comes in. A 3D printed smartphone attachment, the Pooch Selfie is a simple device that attaches a brightly colored tennis ball above your phone’s camera, grabbing your dog’s attention so that you can get that perfect shot.
The Pooch Selfie has launched on Kickstarter, and already has $1,800 of the required $7,000 to bring it to market.
The attachment was designed for iPhones and the Samsung Galaxy, but will work on just about any smartphone or tablet. It slides on easily, and leaves both the front and back cameras unobstructed so you can go from selfie to portait on the fly. And if your dog is really distracted (say, if there’s a squirrel nearby), you can squeak the tennis ball a few times to bring him back.
Pooch Selfie is the result of a year of design, development, and prototyping. While the prototypes were all made with 3D printing technology, funds from the Kickstarter campaign will go towards ordering mass quantities. Priced at just $13 ($10 for the few remaining early birds), there are sure to be plenty of interested pet-loving pledgers.
One potential flaw is that the developers suggest using the attached tennis ball to play fetch after an extended photoshoot…but something about sticking a slobbery, drool-covered ball on top of a $800 device just doesn’t seem right.
It isn’t the most life-changing 3D printing gadget we’ve covered, but the developers seem to have found that sweet spot between ‘this is so ridiculous, why would anyone buy it?’ and ‘wait a minute, I could actually use one of those.’ Heck, if it means not scrolling through anymore blurry dog photos on Instagram, I’m all for it.
Posted in 3D Printing Applications
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