Other: Has anyone ever had to shoot 360 video?

jasonbrooks

jasonbrooks

Well-known member
Hey folks,

Just had an equiry (speculatively shooting early next year) to produce some monoscopic 360 footage for viewing in VR in a museum context. I've never shot like this before, but reckon I'm up for the challenge. Happy to work through and test everything on a pro-filmic and stylistic level, but wondering if anyone had any experience and/or input on kit.

It seems that a 6-camera GoPro rig can work pretty well, but there's also the Insta360 One X which seems to have some pretty good press. Most of the reviews out there at consumer-oriented so don't tell me that much.

Any input?

Cheers,

jason
 
Insta360 One R is an excellent choice in this prosumer space. Much preferable to the GoPro IMHO. Insta360 also has a pro-line of 360 cameras that would take you to a higher level. Perhaps start with one of the prosumer cameras to get a feel of the shooting and workflow. And determine whether the quality is adequate. If not, investigate the pro cameras. I have the One X and the One R. Haven't shot as much as I was hoping to do with them and I wrote a short piece on the One R. Advantage of the One R is that it has 3 detachable heads-- Wide angle 4K, 360 dual lens, and a 1" still to be released but covid-delayed.
 
Played with this type of thing a couple of years ago, but after a couple of jobs the clients that were interested in it decided it wasn't worth the effort / $$$
We ended up with a 7 camera system because it gave us a little more control of the overlaps. Getting the overlap points seamless was always difficult - so if using a multi-camera system make sure you can minimize movement through your overlap areas. Having a system where all the recording triggers simultaneously is a big plus as well. Make sure you can manually set up the cameras to avoid color or exposure issues at the transition points.
We used Kolor software to stitch everything together.
 
Shot VR in Morocco for Fox for Prison Break S5. It was a nightmare. We were in the Sahara, 134F temps, we had a ball of Go Pros rig with 10 of them and most of the time, they were shutting themselves off from overheating.
The stitching from the few times the whole thing worked was a nightmare. As you know, the fewer cameras in the rig, the better, less things to go wrong. Go Pros suck anyway, they look terrible. We used the Go Pro Fusion for another
shoot a year ago and it was much, much easier to deal with, it was in bright daylight so all of the noise issues were fine. If you are doing low end, the Insta 360 is the hot tip.

If this is for a higher end client and app, I strongly suggest you work with Radiant Images, they are pretty much the state of the art rental facility for high end VR rigs in the world. https://www.radiantimages.com/immersive
I've worked with them on several projects and they have in-house expertise and solutions that nobody else does.

Just to prep you, everything about shooting and posting 360 video is a PITA, it's not a "normal" workflow. I strongly suggest doing a lot of testing before your shoot day.
 
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Here is some 360 video shot at the same gallery during a show with a lot of guests. Lighting is challenging here because most is shining on the art rather than the attendees. Something to watch out for with the Insta360 units - they have a fan that kicks in after about 15 minutes, may be an issue if you depend on the on-board audio, also no xlr inputs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VlhUy_Yp0Y
There is a 360 camera marketplace on FB where you might look for a camera.
 
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