Life with the Narrative Clip: An interview with Susan Pigott

Location:
Abilene, TX

How long have you been using your Narrative Clip?
About two months

How often do you use your Clip and in what settings?
I’ve been using my Clip daily during our vacation to the Grand Tetons and Moab, Utah. I take it on our hikes.

Please explain your decision behind getting a Narrative Clip?
I loved the idea of having a hands-free camera capturing things without me consciously taking pictures. I’m a photographer, but sometimes I feel like I’m focusing so much on taking pictures that I miss enjoying the actual events. The Clip gives me peace of mind so I don’t have to take pictures constantly as we hike. Plus, it captures things I would not ordinarily take pictures of, such as photos of us hiking, things on the side of the trail that I miss while we’re hiking, our snack breaks, and other people we meet on the trail.

Describe what is it about the Narrative Clip that you like best?
There are so many things I love about the Clip. I love having a hands-free camera that is taking pictures constantly and capturing things I might miss. I love looking through the moments after our hikes, because I never know what I will see. There’s a wonderful element of surprise with the clip because it’s capturing things you’re unaware of. So when you scan through the photos many “aha!” moments occur when you see something unexpected or surprising. I often find myself saying, “Wow!” when I look at a photo of something I don’t remember seeing while hiking. I also love the candid aspects of the photos—nothing posed or superficial about the people in the pictures.

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How do you wear/use the camera?
I wear the camera on the right strap of my backpack. It points outward toward the right so it captures my family hiking in front of me but also the side of the trail next to us. I like this position better than in the center because if I put it on my center strap all it captures is the back of my family. With it on the shoulder strap, positioned about chest level, I get the best of both worlds. The only problem with this position is that I get lots of pictures of my arm when I’m using my regular cameras to take pictures. The worst thing about that is I can see how badly I need to do some pushups.

What’s the most surprising and/or interesting photo you’ve gotten so far?
Oh, man, this is a tough question. I’ve gotten some fantastic photos of the wilderness in the Grand Tetons and Moab. But probably the most surprising photo is one that the Clip took through my jacket. It shows trees near Emma Matilda Lake in the Grand Teton National Park framed by my jacket zipper. For some reason, I just think this shot is cool.

Do you have any stories around how people react to the Clip?
So far, I’ve only had two people ask me about the Clip during our vacation. The first was when I was paragliding. I was in midair trying to attach the Clip to the harness and my paragliding pilot asked what it was and I explained it to him. Unfortunately, I attached the Clip too far up and mostly got sky pictures. Somebody else asked me if it was an altimeter.

What is best moment you’ve captured with the Narrative Clip and why?
This is another difficult question because I’ve had so many wonderful moments captured by the Clip. Probably the best moment, even though it’s not the clearest photo, is when I paraglided off of Rendezvous mountain. The Clip captured one really great shot of the landscape and another paraglider below.

What’s a specific use case for your Narrative Clip that you’re looking forward to trying out?
I’m a university professor. So when school starts up again in the fall, I want to do a “Day in the Life of a Professor” blog post using Narrative Clip photos.

What’s a feature(s) you’d really like to see added to the Narrative service in the future?
–As a photographer, I would most certainly like a higher megapixel camera, but I would say 16mp would be the max. 8 to 12 would probably be just fine.

–I’d love to see a frame for the Clip that would allow it to be attached in a variety of ways, much like the frame mount for the GoPro (Am I allowed to mention that here? Just FYI: I bought a GoPro, hated it, and returned it in favor of a Narrative Clip). Anyway, a frame mount would allow you to attach the Clip to a helmet, a chest mount, a wrist mount, etc. It might also provide some stabilization for the clip.

–Maybe an actual button for taking intentional shots. I’ve found the two tap method to be intermittently successful. Sometimes I have to tap several times before the clip will respond. Still, I really, really love the simplicity of the clip and the lack of buttons is part of that. Perhaps just making the two tap thing more reliable would fix this.

–Lens attachments would be great. Please do not make the internal lens wide angle. I also bought an Autographer before I got the Clip. It’s lens is super wide angle and every photograph is horribly distorted. The Autographer got returned in favor of the Narrative Clip. That said, having attachable lenses would allow people to do fun things like fisheye photos or wider angle shots if they wanted to do so.

Anything else you’d like to add or other Clip photos you’d like to share?
I am so happy with the Narrative Clip. I would recommend it to anyone who does a lot of hiking because it is simply perfect for that. My life is too boring to log every day stuff (except maybe for that blog post I mentioned above). But for special events (birthdays, reunions, weddings, etc.) and for hiking, the clip is fantastic.

I’m attaching some of the best photos taken by my Narrative Clip during our trip: