Review: Snaps On A Bottle

July 8, 2007 | By Jared Howard | 970 Views

Everybody loves taking pictures. It’s becoming almost as common today to have a digital camera on you as it is a cell phone (plus cell phone cameras are getting better every day). Life is one big string of memories and people like to preserve those memories. Unfortunately a lot of us are not nearly as good of photographers as we’d like, but it’s not all our faults. We’ve all had our share of blurry, out of focus pictures and no amount of image stabilization software or any other feature in cameras today can replace a good old fashion tripod, at least not yet. The problem with tripods however is #1, a majority of them are rather bulky, not exactly something you can throw in your pants pocket or purse. #2 is price, tripods range anywhere from $20 to over $2,000, making it very hard to determine exactly how much you should or have to spend for what you need. Part one of this three part series looks to solve problem #1 with an ingenious little product.

Snaps On A Bottle does exactly what its name implies. Its base is a rubber cap that is designed to fit snuggly over any bottle cap you’d find on a 2 litter or 20 oz bottle of soda/juice. The top of the device contains a standard tripod mount screw that should accommodate pretty much any digital camera and or even camcorder.

The mounting platform is connected to the base by a ball bearing design allowing it to twist 360 degrees and rotate and tilt back and forth (to 15-20 degrees I’d say). The beauty of this product lies in the fact that it is extremely small making it perfect to carry around. Just “set it” in a bag or purse and “forget it” until you need or want to use it. With 20 oz bottles of soda/juice/water available pretty much everywhere you have an instant tripod ready at a moment’s notice.

Now this solution is not without its limitations. Obviously you are severely limited in making vertical adjustments as you are confined to pretty much two heights, that of a 2 litter and 20 oz bottle (or at least widely available heights). A solution like this also requires you to be near a flat raised surface like a table or shelf. This isn’t something you’d use on the beach during summer vacation probably. Also, although the connecting hardware will fit any camcorder that utilizes a universal tripod mounting screw, this obviously isn’t something you’d use to tape a wedding. Although for quick self “webcam” type clips, it will work, though stability may be an issue unless you have a really small/light camcorder. But for its size and price Snaps On A Bottle really can’t be beat. The fact that you can throw this in a pocket or purse and go has instantly made a lot of use better photographers already.

Be sure to check out part 2 of the Cheap Pod Shootout next week to see the Snaps On A Bottle concept taken a couple of steps further.

Price: $8.00

Snaps On A Bottle

Rating

Posted in Accessories, Gadgets, Reviews