---
title: "ReviewForest Labs: StatusCam, the polite way to step away from a video call"
date: "2026-07-23"
author: "Leon"
categories: ["ReviewForest Labs"]
url: "https://blog.reviewforest.org/statuscam-the-polite-way-to-step-away-from-a-video-call"
language: "en"
---

Today's post has nothing to do with reviews. Or trees. Bear with me.

Every now and then someone on our team builds something small that was never on any roadmap. A tool we wished existed, so at some point we just made it. Those projects used to die quietly on someone's laptop. We've decided to release them instead, for free, under the name **ReviewForest Labs**.

This is the first one.

## The empty chair problem

You know this situation: you're in a group call, and the doorbell rings. Or the kids need something. Or you simply need a coffee if this meeting is going to run another hour.

You can't really leave. If you turn your camera off, you're a black tile and people wonder where you went. If you leave it on, everyone watches your empty chair. Typing "brb" into the chat helps exactly the three people who have the chat open.

There wasn't a good way to say "I'll be right back, keep going, I'm still listening" without interrupting the meeting to say it. So we built one.

## What StatusCam does

[StatusCam](https://statuscam.app) is a virtual camera for the Mac. In your video call, you pick "StatusCam" as your camera once, and normally it just passes your real camera through — nobody sees any difference.

When you need to step away, you flip one switch (or press ⌥⌘B, which works even while Meet or Zoom is in the foreground). Instead of your empty chair, callers now see a clean, friendly status card: "Be right back", "Listening — not at desk", or whatever text you want, with your name on it. The meeting keeps going, you keep listening from the kitchen, and nobody has to ask "did we lose Leon?"

When you're back, flip the switch again and your real camera returns. You never touch the camera picker mid-call.

A few details we're a bit proud of: the background blur runs on your Mac, so you can turn off Meet's blur and the card still looks sharp. There's a transparent mode that lays the card over your live video instead of replacing it. And if none of the preset cards fit, you just write your own text.

## No network access. None.

Here's the part that matters to us: StatusCam processes everything on your Mac. It has no network access at all, and that's not a promise buried in a privacy policy. The macOS App Sandbox enforces it, so the app couldn't phone home even if we wanted it to. There's no account to create and no analytics for the same reason: nothing can leave your machine.

We spend our days building software that businesses trust with their customer data, so this was the only way we were comfortable shipping a camera app.

## Free on the Mac App Store

StatusCam is free, runs on macOS 14 or later, and is made by us, ReviewForest GmbH. You can get it from the [Mac App Store](https://apps.apple.com/app/statuscam/id6788707192?mt=12) or read more at [statuscam.app](https://statuscam.app).

If you try it in your next team call, tell us how it went. And there's a second Labs app coming in a post soon — that one involves toddlers.