Pocket Clapper

Even if you’ve never been on the set of a movie or TV show you already know what a “clapper” is, and I’m not talking about the thing that turns your lights on and off. In “the business” it’s also called a slate, and it’s the thing that gets held in front of the camera (and clapped) before a scene gets shot. It helps production staff keep track of what’s what, but its original purpose is to literally provide a frame of reference for syncing pictures to sound since they’re often recorded separately.

Pocket Clapper aspires to replace those big, clunky slates. Visually, it looks just like a slate and you can even write on it with a really clumsy piece of iPhone chalk. I really wish they’d made it so you could type your scene info because scrawling things with the chalk isn’t easy. A quick double-tap will zoom in or out for easier writing, but it’s still a slow and painful process. Luckily you can switch from chalk to eraser to fix mistakes or rewrite the slate for the next scene.

Unfortunately, the chalk is really the least of Pocket Clapper’s worries.

When your sound is recorded separately, you need the “clapper” so that you can SEE the arm make contact with the slate at the exact moment that the clapping sound is recorded… and this is where Pocket Clapper really needs some work.

For starters, I’m not entirely sure the sound is perfectly synced with the clapping animation. It could be, and it looks pretty right on in the video below, but on my iPhone it seems to be off by a tiny bit except for when I do the clap while zoomed in. I guess the only real way to tell is to play a video of the animation in an editing bay where you can watch (and listen) frame-by-frame.

Also, in order to get a sound out of this virtual slate you have to shake the iPhone. Can you see where this would be a problem? There’s a small delay after shaking before the slate actually claps but, if the iPhone is still moving at the time that the sound is recorded, getting a perfect sync is going to be hard to do.

Luckily for GClue, Inc. this app can easily be fixed. All they need to do is throw in a nice big button to trigger the arm-clap and corresponding sound, and replacing the chalk with typing would also be appreciated.

I really like the idea of a $.99 “clapper” because a lot of filmmakers are way too broke to afford a real slate and have to clap their hands in front of the camera as a substitute. If Pocket Clapper can fix itself up a little with an update it’ll be worth paying for, but for the time being I’d advise poor directors to keep clapping their hands.