Move Over 360-Degree Video, Lytro's Light Field Video Is (Almost) Here

[kcarbotte]

Lytro revealed the first 360-degree light field video recorded with its Lytro Immerge light field camera technology. The days of standard 360-degree video might be numbered before the technology even got a foothold in the market.

Move Over 360-Degree Video, Lytro's Light Field Video Is (Almost) Here : Read more

 

[SockPuppet]

Amazing. This is what VR needs to become mainstream. VR movies like this are the thing to get HMDs in the homes of "normal" people.

 

[bit_user]

This is it.

I saw it on their website, a few months ago, and it was clear to me that it's the logical conclusion of what 360-degree cameras want to be.

 

[Geekwad]

I've been watching Lytro for some time, and only hope that this coupled with the eventual IMAX experience on a StarVR (and someday an equivalent home experience) is where consumer VR continues to high-step towards.

 

[Brian_R170]

I'm guessing Tim Trillion is the VP of Engineering, not the VR of engineering?

 

[WFang]

Great... Now if this doesn't get the tin-foil hat "The moon landing is not real" people going, then nothing ever will.. I'm sure they will use this as proof that it was all fabricated and this technology has existed all along in secret government labs.

Why could they not have used a different subject matter? A mountain top or something.

 

[jaber2]

Tim Trillion is that a real name? was Billion too low?

 

[wifiburger]

just like 3d displays this will fade into obscurity and nobody will care or write about it, pass !

 

[bit_user]

Great... Now if this doesn't get the tin-foil hat "The moon landing is not real" people going, then nothing ever will.. I'm sure they will use this as proof that it was all fabricated and this technology has existed all along in secret government labs.

Why could they not have used a different subject matter? A mountain top or something.

I had the exact same thought. Cool tech, dumb demo.

But, the reality is that people who want to believe the Apollo moon landings were faked will do so, regardless of any evidence to the contrary. Similarly, feeding them a little more "evidence" in support of this idea won't make much difference, especially when they were already satisfied with 1970's-era technology.

 

[DSpider]

"Light field technology doesn’t really record video. It records real-world light ray trajectories and then calculates what the scene would look like based on your viewpoint. Lytro then combines that data with live-action video and with 3D renderings to reproduce true to life imagery."

So... it's not going to be an actual 1:1 representation of what's in front of you.

Reminds me of an older Will Smith movie called "Enemy of the State": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EwZQddc3kY That's NOT how cameras work, lol. You can't "rotate" if nothing was there (like another camera) to capture it. It even says "it can hypothesize, Chris". Yeah, right...

 

[srmojuze]

"Light field technology doesn’t really record video. It records real-world light ray trajectories and then calculates what the scene would look like based on your viewpoint. Lytro then combines that data with live-action video and with 3D renderings to reproduce true to life imagery."

So... it's not going to be an actual 1:1 representation of what's in front of you.

Reminds me of an older Will Smith movie called "Enemy of the State": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3EwZQddc3kY That's NOT how cameras work, lol. You can't "rotate" if nothing was there (like another camera) to capture it. It even says "it can hypothesize, Chris". Yeah, right...

I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it. From what I gather from the article this is pretty hardcore, or the start of something ~very~ hardcore... I really thought this was years away, not 2016.

Basically what we have in the next several years will be an interplay between light-field (eg. Lytro), laser-scanning (eg. Euclideon) and image-scanning (see Blendswap for examples) to recreate an entire 3D capture of a scene.

If it is just one camera then light-field interpolation will be difficult and you'd generally have a fixed perspective based on where the camera is. "Enemy Of The State" and "Deja Vu" will not quite be possible (unless Lytro has some big tricks up their sleeve and can actually "backtrace" light bounces to such an incredible degree).

Regardless, imagine setting up 3 - 4 cameras and capturing a scene. That's essentially full VR cinema right there. Given the right software, that means you can have full 3D x-y-z positioning ie. viewing the video capture from any angle.

Also, since that creates an entire 3D capture of whatever is being filmed (let's assume they start with live action movies) you could go to a cinema, strap on a StarVR or something like that, then all you'd have to do is stream the movie and the user can choose whatever angle to view it from (it might be limited to 3-5 angles at the start for practical and aesthetic purposes)... applications for home cinema would also follow accordingly.

Over time I imagine live 3D video/light-field capture can be integrated with offline or realtime rendered 3D.

Wow. I thought 2K each eye was impressive for VR already (with StarVR) but all this "additional" stuff happening. Just didn't expect it.

 

[bit_user]

"Light field technology doesn’t really record video. It records real-world light ray trajectories and then calculates what the scene would look like based on your viewpoint. Lytro then combines that data with live-action video and with 3D renderings to reproduce true to life imagery."

So... it's not going to be an actual 1:1 representation of what's in front of you.

What it's capturing is the set of all possible views from the lenses that can see in a given direction.

The main benefit is that, unlike conventional 360 degree cameras, you get realistic depth. Unlike depth cameras, this works in all lighting conditions to the extent that you can see. It also means that you could zoom in a particular direction, as if you were wearing binoculars.

However, the article overemphasizes the ability of one to move their head to either side. The amount you can move your head (and see real data) is constrained by the size of the camera. So, it's not like you could get up out of your chair and look around something. I mean, you could, but you'd find holes behind the thing you're trying to see around.