More New VR Cameras, Meet Sphericam
Posted on Jul 3, 2015 by Julian Mitchell
Sphericam 2 has six cameras, eight tripod mount points, six Micro SD card slots and 4k raw.
Yesterday we reported on a new camera system for VR capture called Jaunt VR, today we have the Sphericam.
Sphericam 2 is a KickStarter project. A spherical, 360º camera that allows you to capture absolutely everything around you in 4k without any blind spots. You can watch the resulting videos on a VR Headset (like Oculus Rift, Samsung Gear VR or Google Cardboard) or on your iPad, tablet, PC or mobile phone.
VR is the next new thing but it’s even more difficult to shoot than 3D. Where do you put lights, or the crew, or cables? How should you move the camera. Can you use zoom lenses, filters or in fact most of your lenses.
But the likes of Oculus Rift and Samsung are outbidding each other to create the best VR viewing platforms, there is a critical part of the puzzle still missing – how do you create stunning VR content in the first place?
Most cinematic VR creation attempts so far have been classic first attempts. Think blind spots, uneven stitching and mismatched white balance from unsynchronised sensors. There just aren’t many people who want to go through the months of training required to operate six sports cameras stuck together, and the tremendous amount of tricky post processing that is needed to make such footage watchable.
Dog not included in the price!
But Sphericam think they have the answer. A design that is no bigger than a tennis ball with six cameras working together to capture the world around you in 4K resolution and with a global shutter that records Cinema DNG raw and 10-bit H.264 video. All with automatic real time stitching.
They also mention automatic stabilisation but without going in to more details. Also multiple tripod mounts, four microphones and six Micro SD card slots.
WiFi and GPS are on-board and the system comes with their mobile app that allows you to start/stop recording, monitor the view, while recording, transfer, view, edit.
