Exclusive inventory of panorama camera's most comprehensive VR cameras: which is stronger in panorama camera?

Introducing consumer panoramic cameras:

millet

On April 5th, Xiaomi released the Mijia panorama camera, which consists of two 190 fisheye lens cameras. You can use it independently without a mobile phone.

Mijia parameters: Anba A 12 processor, Sony IMX 206 sensor, 23.88 million effective pixels, built-in 6-axis electronic anti-shake, which can correct rollover, pitch and yaw in real time during use, and obtain stable and smooth images. Comply with IP67 waterproof and dustproof certification. It can meet the daily shooting needs of family, outdoor and news. Price 1699 yuan.

Nubian

On April 6th, Nubia released the NeoAirVR panorama camera. Equipped with two wide-angle lenses with 2 10 fisheye lenses, it can shoot pictures with a resolution of 3008× 1504 and videos with a resolution of 2560× 1280, with a frame rate of 30fps. Panoramic content can be automatically spliced without post-processing, supporting fish-eye, asteroid, crystal ball, perspective and other modes.

The price is 699, which can only be used with mobile phones (currently only Android phones are supported) and cannot be used independently, which is one of the important reasons why it is cheaper than Xiaomi 1000.

Ricoh

Ricoh announced that it will publicly display its newly developed new THETA 360 panoramic camera at the 20 17 National Radio and Television Equipment Exhibition. The biggest feature of the new machine will be that it can shoot 360 full-motion video with 30 fps and 4K resolution, and at the same time use the built-in four-channel microphone for stereo recording.

Professional panorama camera

Google

In late April, Google released YiHalo, an upgraded product after Jump. YiHalo, developed by Xiaomi's brand Little Ant in cooperation with Google, consists of 17 cameras, of which 16 cameras are assembled into a circular array in a surrounding manner, and 1 camera is installed on the top of the disc.

YiHalo adopts Anba A9SE75 chip, Sony IMX377 sensor,12 million pixels. It can shoot 30 frames per second with 8k resolution/60 frames per second with /5.8k resolution. Price 16999, for professional video content production team.

Facebook

On April 20th, Facebook published Surround 360 X24/X6 panorama camera.

X24 consists of 24 cameras and X6 consists of 6 cameras. Different from the disc design of surround360, X24/X6 all adopt spherical design. It supports shooting videos with up to 8K resolution at 6DoF. Through 6DOF tracking, Facebook's own OculusRift and HTC's Vive users will be able to move in any direction of lens shooting, not just watching the whole scene from a fixed central position of 360 degrees. At present, only computer-generated images can achieve this effect.

Several important parameters of panorama camera are as follows:

1. Number of cameras: Panoramic cameras are spliced by multiple cameras. The more cameras, the higher the number of effective pixels per unit angle, the smaller the picture distortion and the better the visual effect. However, the greater the corresponding calculation, the more difficult the stitching is, and the greater the cost of hardware and algorithm. At present, the panorama camera scheme with less than 6 cameras can barely achieve internal splicing, and more than 6 cameras generally need to be spliced on a dedicated workstation.

2. Resolution: including picture resolution and video resolution. As for the picture resolution, the mainstream in consumer-grade panorama camera is 4K, and the highest in professional-grade panorama camera is 8K.

3. Image quality: Image quality is the quality of the final picture, including detail resolution, gradation and contrast. The main factors affecting the image quality are the image quality of CMOS sensor and the processing algorithm of ISP chip.

4. Imaging consistency. Mainly refers to exposure, white balance and other parameters. Panorama camera is based on the stitching of multiple cameras. When there is a unidirectional strong light source in the scene (such as the setting sun in the morning), the incident light intensity of cameras at different angles is different, and the exposure parameters are very different. Inconsistent exposure, at this time, it is obvious that the brightness in the picture is inconsistent, which seriously affects the mosaic algorithm.

5. Safe distance: Many panorama camera rely on overlapping pictures taken by adjacent lenses and matching the same features to achieve stitching. When the subject is close to the lens, the same features are few, and it is easy to be deformed or dislocated when stitching. This critical distance is the safe distance. The smaller the safe distance, the better.

6. Built-in splicing: Panoramic images are spliced in panorama camera, which is very convenient to operate and use. However, the built-in stitching requires high internal heating and computing performance, and it is easy to realize when the number of cameras is less than six.

Problems in panorama camera with Pisces Eyes

Pisces eye technique is the mainstream scheme in panorama camera at present, but it is not the most ideal scheme in panorama camera.

Panorama camera of Pisces Eye needs two cameras to have the same overlapping area before stitching, so each fisheye lens is above 180, and 190 and 200 are the most common. But a fisheye lens with such a large field of view will cause many problems. To sum up, there are three main points:

Image edge distortion is serious.

The distortion degree of fisheye image gradually increases from the center of the circle to the surrounding. Generally, the image of the center is normal, but the surrounding area will be seriously deformed. As shown below, the people around and the roof are seriously deformed. This is unfavorable to the splicing after the fisheye is unfolded.

Large safe distance

The smaller the safe distance, the better. However, the technical scheme of Pisces Eye makes the safe distance bigger, and people's arms can't be close together well when shooting with their hands. Or when shooting in narrow spaces such as indoors, columns or ceilings are prone to faults and distortions.

Low effective pixel per unit angle

In fact, there is no difference between the COMS photosensitive element used in fisheye lens and the general camera, but because only a part of the middle circle of square COMS is used, the actual effective photosensitive element area is reduced, and the field of view covered by fisheye lens is much larger than the ordinary field of view, so the effective pixels of each view angle are diluted very little. For example, a panorama camera composed of two fisheye lenses with 654.38+0.2 million pixels may be only about one thirtieth of the general viewing angle of a mobile phone with 654.38+0.2 million pixels (generally less than 70).

Classification of current shooting equipment

Before introducing the development trend of panorama camera, let's talk about the classification of shooting equipment at present. At present, shooting equipment is mainly divided into three categories: mobile phone cameras, video cameras and film cameras.

Among them, the mobile phone camera is aimed at ordinary individual users, which has low requirements for shooting quality, but is sensitive to price. Generally used to take photos of life, travel and so on.

Film and television camera equipment is faced with a professional film and television production company, which requires high imaging quality and long-term stability. The price is also very high.

Cameras are somewhere in between, and the most common is SLR cameras. There are both consumer products for ordinary users and professional products for professional users.

The Future Development Trend of panorama camera

In the future, panorama camera is likely to be divided into three corresponding development directions like the above-mentioned shooting equipment.

Panoramic camera as mobile phone accessory

Due to the limitation of the size (especially the thickness) of the mobile phone body, the mobile phone lens can not have a series of functions such as large-size photosensitive element, wide-range adjustable aperture and wide-range adjustable focal length like a SLR. So there is a reason why panorama camera exists as an extension of mobile phone in camera shooting.

This panorama camera mainly adopts the technical scheme of "Pisces Eye", and its main R&D strength is mobile phone manufacturers (Samsung, Xiaomi, Nubian, LG, etc.). ) and some third-party manufacturers (Ricoh, insta 360, etc. ).

At present, there are many panorama camera in this direction, and their development is relatively mature. China Augmented Reality Industry Alliance believes that the future development trend is:

1, miniaturization. Because it is mainly used with mobile phones, it is very important to be light and compact.

2. Stupid. It can realize automatic panoramic stitching and real-time preview without direct transmission to mobile phone through computer. The operation is simple and you can get started quickly.

3. ecology. Provide supporting APP software, support image editing, character beautification, mainstream social software sharing, value-added services and other functions. Form a complete industrial chain.