Jan 09
Throwing a camera is generally a bad idea – lenses tend to be delicate – but Panono positively begs to be tossed. The spherical, lens-studded camera ball slammed through its … Continue reading
Jan 03
Just today the folks behind the Panoramic Ball Camera known as Panono have reached their goal of a cool $900k in their crowd-funded venture through Indegogo. This means the team … Continue reading
Nov 12
All the way back in 2011 we had our first look at the Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera – well before it was ready to be manufactured as a consumer product. Here at the tail end of 2013, taking full advantage of the current craze that is crowd-funding, the same fellow who headed the project two […]
Aug 18
The Human Media Lab at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario in Canada just released a video showing off the FlexCam, a new panoramic camera that combines a flexible OLED viewfinder with a camera array. The lenses are located on the back of the device, allowing users to bend and flex it to take panoramic photographs. […]
Jul 10
A wild spherical camera appears! Actually it’s not the first of its kind that we’ve seen, but unlike the previous device, Serveball’s Squito is being designed for both professional and recreational use. Forget about Instagram or Vine, the cool kids will want to get ball shots! Yeah! No.
According to Serveball’s press release, the current prototype of Squito has three cameras, an inertial measurement unit, a microcontroller and an image processor. As you’ll see in the video below, the prototype can take 360º panoramic pictures and videos. When taking pictures, the Squito can reorient and stitch the images that its cameras take. When shooting a video, the Squito can stabilize the video, but don’t expect a free falling camera to be as steady as one on a tripod. The Squito will also be able to wirelessly send its pictures and videos to PCs and mobile devices.
The tail end of the video featured a version of the Squito with night vision and thermal imaging capabilities. From what I can tell those features will be on a separate variant of the Squito, which Serveball is calling the Darkball. Fold your browser into a ball and throw it to Serveball’s website for more on its cameras.
[via Engadget]
Jun 10
Insert Coin: BubblePod clockwork turntable lets your phone capture 360-degree images
Posted in: Today's ChiliIn Insert Coin, we look at an exciting new tech project that requires funding before it can hit production. If you’d like to pitch a project, please send us a tip with “Insert Coin” as the subject line.
The problem with capturing panoramic stills with your phone is that you need to keep a steady motion when panning around, but we all know that only a robot can perform such feat perfectly. That’s why this little BubblePod caught our attention. The device is essentially a mini clockwork turntable so no battery is required — just wind it up, slip an iOS, Android or BB10 device into the silicone grip, fire up the BubblePix app and hit the BubblePod’s release button for a steady 40-second rewind.
The sample panoramic shots (or “bubbles”) we saw have almost no visible stitching, and the app can simultaneously record an audio clip to capture the atmosphere as well. Better yet, in addition to its rubberized base, the BubblePod is also built with a universal tripod mount plus a wine bottle insert mount!
This Kickstarter project will offer a unit if you pledge a minimum of £15 (about $23) for the limited early bird offer or £20 (about $31) later on, plus £5 (about $8) to ship outside the UK. Do check out the demo video after the break, and feel free to grab yourself a BubblePod before funding ends on July 9th.
Filed under: Peripherals, Mobile
Source: Kickstarter
May 29
Mount Everest and its region are well known, yet something the vast majority of us will never experience in person. That won’t stop us from getting a detailed look at the area, however, thanks to a partnership between Microsoft and GlacierWorks, a non-profit from mountaineer and filmmaker David Breashears. Called Everest: Rivers of Ice, the project allows Web users to interactively travel through the region from behind their computer monitor.
The project is brought in part by Internet Explorer 10, but can be used on whatever browser the user prefers, offering up the virtual tour via HTML5. It isn’t meant merely for exploration, however, instead allowing users to see the changes in the area that have happened over the last almost nine decades since an image of the region was taken by George Mallory in 1927.
The GlacierWorks project opens with a near horizontal map offering clickable links to various areas in the region, including the Everest Base Camp and spanning down through eight other areas. Clicking on an area takes you to an interactive panorama of the specific location, and once there users can zoom in on specific peaks or areas for a closer, and quite detailed, look. Alternatively, there’s an option to click “Start” and be taken from one end of the region to the other in order.
Such imagery was captured using gigapixel images, comparative photography, video, and hot spot overlays. Although you can tour it via your browser and mouse, it was specifically made for touchscreens and touch devices, supporting multi-touch and making it simple to move from one area to the next with finger swipes. Such a virtual look into the region hasn’t ever previously been available.
The website also features a video, which shows up first when the project is visited. Says Microsoft, this provides a different kind of storytelling over conventional methods, providing a narrative that, rather than having a beginning, middle, and end, thrusts users into the mix and allows them to see the story for themselves via interactive participation.
SOURCE: Windows Blog
Microsoft and GlacierWorks join forces to offer virtual Everest experience is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Apr 25
Google Glass Easter Egg Introduces You To The Entire Team In A Panoramic Image Controlled By Your Head’s Movement
Posted in: Today's Chili
As more developers are receiving their pair of Google Glass, the tinkering with the device is heating up. One developer found a very interesting easter egg within Glass itself, which introduces you to the entire Glass team.
The steps to reproduce it are fairly simple:
Settings -> Device info -> View licenses -> Tap the touchpad 9 times -> Tap Meet Team
Here’s a video demo, including the neat sounds that happen as you keep tapping:
The neat part about the photo is that you can see the entire 360-degree panoramic image by moving your head around. This was hard to show in the MyGlass screencast, since it lags a little bit. We’ve learned that Mike LeBeau, Senior Software Engineer for Google X, is the one who dropped the hidden gem into Glass’ software. He’s appeared on TechCrunch before in a <a target="_blank" href="“>hilarious Google blooper reel.
The team photo has Google co-founder, Sergey Brin, front and center.
I’m sure that more of these easter eggs will pop up over time, but this one is particularly cool since it’s the first time that I’ve seen a panoramic image on the device since I started using it. This functionality could be something that isn’t exposed in the Mirror API as of yet, but once it is, it’ll be a fun one.
Apr 17
Video conferencing, especially in a work setting, can be a real pain in the ass. But PanaCast, unlike other video conferencing platforms, actually seems like something that would be both fun and exceedingly useful.
PanaCast is a crowdfunded panoramic video conferencing platform that Ross Rubin covered back in December in one of his Backed Or Whacked posts. Ross wholeheartedly backed the project, and since then PanaCast’s Kickstarter blew past its original fundraising goal of $15,000, raising nearly three times that amount.
Today PanaCast will be made available for the public to purchase for what they call a “market disrupting price” of $599 with a monthly subscription fee of $19.99.
What PanaCast offers is a unique panoramic video conferencing experience. It utilizes a special webcam that resembles, as Ross noted, an odd-looking UFO on a tripod. When the webcam is attached to the stand, it seems to be about two feet tall, so it’s fairly portable.
Setting up the webcam is easy. Once you have the PanaCast app open on your iOS device and a cellular or wi-fi connection, you scan in the barcode on top of the webcam to connect to it.
The webcam is composed of six different cameras that have had their feeds synchronized for one 200 degree video image that’s 2700 pixels wide and 540 pixels tall. The image itself is crisp and sharp, without any distortion whatsoever, and you can scroll and zoom to any part of the live video feed inside PanaCast’s iOS app.
From the live demos I was shown by Altia Systems, the company behind PanaCast, it’s also extremely responsive. There wasn’t the slightest bit of lag with scrolling and zooming at all. Within the app, you can also switch between multiple feeds pretty easily.
For now, PanaCast is only compatible with iOS devices. They’re planning on releasing desktop and mobile versions of the PanaCast app on Windows, Mac, and Android sometime in the near future.
The PanaCast app is a free download in the iOS App Store, and you can place orders for the PanaCast Camera at Altia’s website here.
Mar 01
Microsoft’s ever-popular panoramic app Photosynth has arrived on the company’s own Windows Phone 8 platform. The app had previously only been available for iOS devices (as well as WP7), but after being absent from Microsoft’s new mobile platform for several months after its release, Windows Phone 8 users can now capture Street View-esque panoramic images with their new Windows Phone devices.
Unlike the Photosynth app for iOS, the Windows Phone 8 version comes with a few exclusive features, including the ability to launch the app from the default camera app. There are also new sharing capabilities that allow Windows Phone 8 users to share and view panoramas with one another, as well as posting to Facebook and Twitter.
There’s also more camera controls. Users can adjust for various lighting conditions by using the new exposure and white balance locking options within the app, which should make panoramic images turn out a lot better. Microsoft boasts that Photosynth is the “only Windows Phone app that can stitch a full sphere (that’s 360 degrees horizontally and vertically).”
The app is really easy to use. All you have to do is tap the screen to start, and then move your phone around in all directions to capture your surroundings with the camera. Whenever you move the camera to a different location, the app will automatically recognize that and will take a photo of that section. You can take full 360-degree images or just a quick panoramic from left to right.
Photosynth panoramic app arrives on Windows Phone 8 is written by Craig Lloyd & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
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