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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Facebook has showed off a 360-degree video camera [tomshardware.com] at its F8 conference, but it won't be for sale:

At its F8 conference, Facebook announced the Surround 360 camera, a professional-grade device built to show what one can do with 360-degree video capture. On stage at F8, Facebook Chief Product Officer Chris Cox explained that creating 360-degree video is, well, difficult. Even once you capture the images, which requires special multi-lens equipment, you have to stitch them together while preserving the fidelity of the images, which is not always so simple. That's not even taking into account the PC hardware you need to handle all the processes.

The Surround 360 will not solve these challenges, because Facebook didn't create the device to sell it; instead, it's a reference design other developers can use to build their own products. Facebook is open sourcing the software and hardware, and the code will be available on Github later this summer.

Cox noted that creating such a camera was a challenge, and the team working on it went through a number of prototypes and much trial and error. For example, he noted, when they used a plastic chassis, they found that the hot sun (not to mention the heat produced by the cameras themselves) warped the case and therefore distorted the images somewhat. The final iteration, though, is one the team is proud of. It can shoot for two hours and produce fully synced, 3D (360-degree) video at 60fps with an astonishing resolution of 8K per eye. Cox said that very little post production will be required.

At Facebook [facebook.com].

Original Submission