How it works

Phone operating systems will not let an ordinary app capture in the background for a month — which is why most time-lapse apps are built for short clips. CorvoCam takes the opposite path: a spare phone, dedicated and powered, running one job as the device’s whole purpose. That single decision is what makes week-after-week capture realistic on hardware you already own.

Dedicated time-lapse cameras solve the same problem with expensive hardware, often with a monthly fee on top. A spare phone with the right software is cheaper, better connected, and easier to replace.

The active job is saved as it runs, frame by frame. If the app crashes, the phone reboots, or a shot hangs, the job resumes on its original timing grid — a frame scheduled for 10:00 still happens at 10:00.

Storage is managed the same way: set a limit and CorvoCam recycles the oldest already-synced frames, or stops cleanly and alerts you — your choice. Battery and storage warnings reach your viewer devices as push alerts.

On supported Android phones, yes: capture runs inside a foreground camera service — the screen can be off while frames keep landing on schedule, with a persistent notification always showing. On other phones, CorvoCam keeps the screen awake behind a true-black dimmer instead.

Because exposure, focus and white balance are genuinely locked. On supported phones the camera converges first, then locks all three, so lighting changes between frames don’t pump the exposure — the classic time-lapse flicker. Where full locking isn’t supported, CorvoCam applies what the hardware allows.

One QR scan. The camera phone shows a code, your signed-in everyday phone scans and claims it, and the camera is bound to your account. From then on, any of your devices — Android, iPhone or browser — sees its health, changes capture settings live, and starts or stops jobs remotely.

Capture keeps running. CorvoCam is offline-first: every frame is stored on the camera phone first, and nothing in the capture path ever waits on the network. Cloud sync drains a durable queue in the background when a connection returns — an outage costs you nothing but remote viewing while it lasts.

Live view connects your devices directly with encrypted WebRTC; an encrypted relay steps in only when a direct connection is impossible. Streams are watched, not stored — our servers never record them.

Time-lapses compile into MP4 video on the camera phone itself — where the frames already live — and compiling can be triggered remotely from any viewer. Videos save locally by default; cloud backup is optional.