The world is not flat - 360 Stereo Consumer Cameras

Sam Scoggins

Well-known member
I've been developing s software product for Virtual Reality (Oculus DK2, Google Cardboard etc) and I'm curious if anyone here has any experience with the new wave of 360 degree cameras, like:

Ricoh Theta
https://theta360.com/en/

Giroptic 360cam dev kit
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/giroptic/the-worlds-first-full-hd-360-camera/posts/1190590

Has anyone here made a 360 degree movie? What's the best camera to get going with? Mono or stereo? Stereo is hard, here are some of the issues: http://elevr.com/elevrant-360-stereo-consumer-cameras/
 
I see there are even more:

v.360
http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/v-360-aims-gopro-panoramic-video-cameras/

Bublecam
http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/bublcam-360-degree-panorama-camera/#!boL8UL

Panono
http://www.digitaltrends.com/photography/panono-360-degree-camera-you-can-throw-in-the-air/#!boL2TO

Obviously flat screens are not going to be the only way to view moving images very soon, with the tidal wave of VR and AR Head Mounted Displays coming from Oculus, Sony, HTC, Microsoft etc etc. Specialist cameras are needed to make film / video for these types of displays. A whole new grammar of 360 film needs to be developed - what happens when you cut from one shot to another in Virtual Reality? It can be very disconcerting.

Exciting times.
 
Seems like you'd need to minimize cuts and do mostly one-shots or linked fluid masters a la Birdman. And POV. And lighting would be severely limited.
 
Here are some experiments with the Ricoh Theta "perfect for researching spherical film as a medium for communication".
http://elevr.com/elevr-casual/
 
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