No. Leave to imagine a kind of C3PO with a camera in hand. I said robot, but no android. The Sony Party-Shot is a kind of platform-shaped section of a sphere, which integrates seamlessly with some compact cameras CyberShot from Sony, using its features face detection and smile to devote to taking pictures to right and left to everyone who put shot ... and without you have to worry about the camera.

After the functions of automatic face detection, Smile or eyes closed all that remained to be done is that the camera alone hiciese photos, and is what gets the Sony Party-Shot.

The "personal photographer" as Sony likes to call it, only works at the moment, with two compact models: the CyberShot DSC-WX1 and CyberShot DSC-TX1. This is because the camera has to be prepared to control the Party-Shot, because their functions are accessed from the menus of the camera.

For several days I have been able to test this particular robot, along with the Cybershot DSC-WX1 of which I have spoken recently, and the truth is that the results have surprised me.

The Party-Shot Sony should be fed to get the maximum battery performance. By doing so we can put anywhere and rotates up to 360 º snapping pictures. If buy a power supply (not included) to forget the batteries, the most you can rotate it 180 degrees, it will depend on the cable. In that case, a good place to place can be next to the television, also connecting its video out to go see on screen is doing the photos.

Once placed the camera on the Party-Shot, we can access its menus to adjust the turning radius (90 º, 180 º or 360 º) or frequency of shots, in three different cadences. No one can speak of an exact number of rounds per minute as it depends on what it takes to frame and focus.

The base fits perfectly with the camera, so that people are using face detection and hopes to smile. It can detect up to eight faces while looking for the best frame and setting parameters for everyone out focused and well lit. Unfortunately it takes a while since we detect a face until triggered, so the photo can not be any trace of a smile ... and sometimes the person, although moving slowly, the camera will face to achieve its goal.

Sony says it will get photos with "a beautiful composition. Obviously you can not ask a robot that has a particular artistic sensibility, but if it is true that the system avoids the frames focused, as might appear at first, and surprise us with different compositions and varied. Even take several photos of the same scene at different zoom settings and several frames. Besides the money, the camera tilts up and down, so it is easy to vary the shots. However, sometimes the system makes mistakes, and can detect as expensive things that really are not.

It is certainly a surprising accessory, which can be interesting if you get used to hold meetings at home and so you're out of the photos, for being behind the camera. And if someone goes wrong in the pictures, can not blame anyone ...

The price of the Sony Party-Shot is 150 euros, maybe a little high, but acceptable for a treat like this. The downside is that you need one of the two chambers discussed above, which cost 350 to 380 euros.