360 rumors

PhotoGearNews' Lok Cheung takes a look at the Yi 360 VR and the Yi Halo. Lok Cheung is well known to photographers as the former colleague of Kai Wong at DigitalRev (before they both left).  At DigitalRev, Lok was the one who was most interested in 360 cameras.  Anyway, he's now at PhotoGearNews. In this video from NAB Show 2017, Lok covers the Yi 360 VR with 5.7K and the Yi Halo 2nd-generation 8K 3D 360 Google Jump rig: In case you missed it, I also have a video from NAB about the Yi 360 VR. Too bad I didn't run into Lok when I was at NAB.  Kai posted a comment on my old blog one time. It would have been nice to say hello.  Perhaps next time!

The first 5.7K sample from the Yi 360 VR camera has been posted!  Check it out!  Also, B&H is now accepting preorders ! Here's the sample, posted by Sami Luo : OBSERVATIONS The detail is amazing for a 360 consumer camera, with noticeable improvement compared to 4K.  Even with YouTube's high compression, you can see the difference in the plate numbers and front grills of the cars here (click for full resolution). left: 5K.  right: 4K You can pixel peep here (click for full resolution): 4K 5K In terms of optics, the sharpness appears excellent, with consistent sharpness almost throughout the field of view, except right at the stitch line. There seems to be no  chromatic aberration or purple fringing whatsoever.  See the lights through the windows of this building: Stitching is not perfect.  For nearby objects, the stitching is quite noticeable.  You can only do so much about parallax stitching error when lenses are not that close to each other. ...

Here are some videos that could be early samples from the Yi 360 VR, a 360 camera with 5.7K video from action camera company Yi Technology. The Yi 360 VR is probably the most significant announcement to come out of NAB, with game-changing 5.7K video (or 4K with in-camera stitching) and 2.5K live streaming at just $400.  To put that in context, each frame of the Yi 360 VR video has about the same resolution as a Ricoh Theta photo (!). Two readers independently spotted some videos that may be samples from the Yi 360 VR. First, Kate Crosby found these videos that were labeled as test live stream videos from the "Yi 360 camera," which seems to be a test from a Yi Technology employee.  The video resolution is only 720p, but that could be because of the limited internet speed in China (presumably). There are other similar videos from the video's author.  Despite the low 720p resolution, the video is actually quite detailed.  In this frame grab, you can see the individual ...

Probably the biggest news for 360 cameras out of NAB Show 2017 is the Yi 360 VR, a 360 camera with 5.7K video, the highest video resolution for consumer 360 cameras thus far, for just $399.  I had a chance to talk to Yi Technology about the Yi 360 VR. Here is the 360 video interview with Yi Technology's Director of Marketing.  Also with me was Svend Even Haerra from NRK, Norway's Public Broadcasting Station.  You also get to see my reaction when I first found out about the Yi 360 VR! :D (To shoot the video, I used the Nikon Keymission 360 and Guru 360 gimbal .) If you found the video helpful, please take a moment to hit the Like button on YouTube, and and please consider subscribing to the 360 Rumors YouTube channel ! For specifications and other info on the Yi 360 VR see here .  Again, the Yi 360 VR is $399, shipping in June.  If you are interested in preordering the Yi 360 VR, you can sign up here  (you'll need to scroll down to the bottom of the page). ...