First 360 Panoramic Underwater Video

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bdombrowski

Contributor
Messages
110
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16
Location
Sarasota FL
# of dives
1000 - 2499
seq02_preview.jpg

This is video from the first test of our custom designed and built 360 underwater video rig. The system shoots both stills and video in real time over 360 degrees using multiple HD cameras in a single custom deep water housing.

Viewing Links:

Video as a flat full 360 panoramic on YouTube

Video as an immersive 360 interactive video on my blog


We'll be out on some wrecks soon now that the first trial run was successful.
 
Wow, I finally had a chance to try it out on your bog - awesome! I find myself wanting to make suggestions but only in regards to presentation. Obviously, fixing the whitebalance wouldn't hurt but not a big deal for this demo. Also, it would be cool if there was another smaller view down at the bottom that served several purposes - to see what's behind you and to also serve as the control to rotate the camera and indicate directions such as North. Sorta like a flight game which has a radar display to help with what's behind. But once again, these are things I thought of as I used it.

I honestly believe you have opened a new door in underwater videography (or perhaps videography as well)!

I have many questions but mainly I don't see much of a visible boundary/edge between the frames from the separate cameras. How did you manage to get their exposures so closely matched - or was it mainly done in post? Also, is this with GoPro's or something bigger? How many cameras - perhaps four - or more?
 
Thanks for the feedback. These were GoPros w/o any UW white balance. I was 80 feet deep and the water conditions on this trip were pretty bad. 20 foot vis and somewhat overcast. I only relied on ambient light. I tried to correct somewhat in post using PPCS4 fast color correction, but there just isn't enough light to bring out any reds.

Player controls and even a radar like graphic showing what you're viewing in relation to the 360 are easy to add. I just needed to get something up asap to show I pulled this off.

I designed and built a custom housing with the electronics to help control and synchronize the multiple cameras. I will be adding radial lighting, so that should help color quite a bit. Of course I could add red filters too if I want to drop light by two stops and can tolerate the resulting grain. I didn't have to do anything to balance exposures in this case as the sun was high and I was deep.

Need to hit some wrecks with it when the weather opens an opportunity. The stellar vis we had last summer is gone for a while though.

-Brian
 
So cool! The idea for a compass/direction finder is a great idea, but is it possible to control time as well? I can see myself catching something out of the corner of my eye and wanting to go back.

All and all, how big is the rig?
 
Hi and thanks for the constructive feedback. I was able to add control buttons and a compass with a 'cone of view' like a radar sweep to show where you are looking within the 360. You can even grab the cone with your mouse and rotate your view.

First Immersive 360 Underwater Video | subsurfacemedia.com

I'm working to get a slider at the bottom for moving yourself in time. I think I can have something in a few days.

-Brian
 
Awesome improvements! Can't wait to see what else you can come up with!
 
Darn, the interactive links aren't working for me. IE 9, windows 7 64 bit.

---------- Post added November 18th, 2012 at 09:38 PM ----------

Yikes!!! Worse than I thought...I clicked on the link on your web site and it blue screened my PC!
 
Dang 3D. Are you sure it was my blog that did that? lol. I've just tested on a 64-bit Win7 pro machine but it has IE8. Note the video is Flash based. If I find others have similar repeatable results, then it might be something to look into.

It is working fine with IE8, and recent versions of Chrome and FireFox on both Win7 (64-bit) and WinXp SP2.

-Brian
 
Brian,

Don't know if you made any tweaks since last night, but it's not loading for me anymore; in case you're trying to troubleshoot.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/peregrine/

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