One of Snapchats more cleverideas was not its disappearing messages, but that the smartphone camera should be a toy. Along those same lines, but on a lesser scale,a new app called OOO is meant to be a fun, little camera toy that lets you play with your video. Instead of trying to help you craft the perfect shot, the app lets you rapidly zoom in and out on as quickly or as slowly as you want with just a press of a finger, while you set your mini movieto one of the half-dozen music tracks included with the app.
The end result, explains OOOs co-creator Brett Bergeron, is something that feels more like a music video.
The app comes across as a bit stupid orsilly, but Bergeron insists theres more going on under the hood, like camera stabilization, audio management that adjusts to whether youre wearing headphones, AirPods, the regular mic, or if you have hardware mute enabled. And the app uses 3D Touch, which lets you press hard to more rapidly zoom your shot. Its single purpose is to make a certain kind of video, and its easier to do this kind of crazy zooming in the app instead of in iOSs own camera.
OOO whose name OOO is supposed to be Zooom minus the Z and M, and not out of office, as youd think comes from Brooklyn-based This Also, a design studio Bergeron and Brian Baker set up after leaving Google Creative Lab where they previously worked asdesigners.
The studios clients include startups, Google, Xbox, and Spotify. Most notably, they worked onGoogle Identity and a redesign of the Google App for iOS.
But OOO is the first app theyve built for themselves, and is self-funded.
To use the app, its best on a iPhone that supports Force Touch. That way, you can just press harder or lighter to control the zooming speed. However, you can also slide up to zoom or set your zoom level, then just hold down the button to have the app smoothly zoom for you.
Tucked away in the settings are tools to enable or disable mute, the flash, stabilize the image, reverse, pick the music, and more. The music tracks are originals created by musicians on the team, and are ideal for the video parodies this app will likely produce.
Bergeron says the app is meant to help fill a void on the market, where there are today too many apps focused on pro-sumer photography. OOO is not a professional tool, its a toy.
Future releases will include more music and zoom controls, including noise-controlled zoom. But for the time being, OOO is a free download on the iTunes App Store.
