The Olympics Streams Aren't VR, But They Are Paving The Way posted: 22/08/2016
I think we can do nothing to stop the march of time. Capt deBoeldieu, La Grande Illusion, 1937
At FMS (Flash Memory Summit), I heard a lot of techie discussions on the inner workings of flash; but to me, what's more important is what it will do for customers - business and individuals. So I looked forward to the session on Flash Is a Key to Augmented Reality on Wearables.
It was great by the way; but in the middle of it, Intel's Chris Croteau stated that he wished people would quit making AR/VR (augmented reality/virtual reality) one word.
They're different trust me.
But right away I said to myself, Hey I wish folks would quit calling 360 video 360VR or just VR.
Yes, despite sucking up batteries and data plans, all that Rio Olympics stuff you streamed to your TV, computer, tablet and smartphone wasn't really VR regardless of what NBC, Samsung (they really know better) and all the press hype told you. BBC was more forthcoming. They at least said it was their BBC Sports 360.
And just when you thought good enough was good enough; the video is being streamed in HD (high definition), not 4k; and in mono, not stereo.
Not that analysts and investors care. They like all the stuff with the R initial.
AR/VR Forecasts - Most industry analysts (and manufacturers) project a fantastic future for AR and VR technology, which slip smoothly between the augmented and virtual worlds. Whatever you call it, it's going to be huge!
They just pick the initials they like and say yep, it's gonna' be huge!
What do they care?
To them, everyone's going to wear a mask (HMD - head mounted display).
But in the VR world
Cameras are different, production workflow is different, distribution is different, viewing is different.
Other than that, they're exactly the same!
Most of the 360 video cameras on the market are not cameras, but rather an array of cameras, stuck together in a particular orientation to capture enough overlap for stitching (putting them together into a single shot).
Your Rig May Vary - For a recent 360 streaming project, Nick used an A7Sii rig, courtesy of KonceptVR. He is constantly testing new 360 camera offerings and develops/modifies rigs to deliver the best UX (user experience).
Nick Bicanic, RVLVR Labs, likes to configure his own camera sets as he did for a recent TV degment he completed on the East Coast that will air later this year.
A creative guy in the creative world, he has also been known to put together a bunch of GoPro cameras and ripping off the stock lenses and replacing them with modified fisheye lenses
There are issues using 6-14 separate cameras, so you end up with one unified shot. Nick and others spend the majority of their time and money in the post production phase stitching the various camera frames together into one seamless 360 degree frame.
For the most part, the same is true for 360 degree and VR cameras from firms like Jaunt, Nokia, Samsung and others determined to be first to market with equipment people want for professional and amateur filmmakers (how can we forget the marvelous YouTube, Facebook video shooters, showers).
Nick emphasized that stitching is a multistep process. The cameras footage is brought into software and you merge the video streams together. That can cost $10,000 per finished minute and more hours and hours of work.
Once stitching is done, you're about 90 percent there for the film, he said. The last 10 percent is compositing, rotoscoping and other somewhat traditional editing/post work. That's the hard and creative stuff.
The recently announced Sphericam 360/VR camera is said to address this major pain point by including software in the camera that automatically stitches the lens frames into a single frame. Solutions like this will be in big demand once you've done a couple of 360 or VR projects.
With a 360-degree environment like the one you saw if you watched any of the streaming video from the Olympics, viewers can look anywhere,
A number of filmmakers say because of that, you can't really produce a show/film that directs viewer's attention and you can't frame scenes anymore; you simply shoot and turn it over to the viewer to control the story.
Lewis Smithingham, who has been shooting/producing 360 and VR projects for more than three years, disagrees.
Leading in VR - The easiest way for Lewis to explain how the filmmaker can encourage virtual viewers is that it's very similar to the way he gets his cat to follow a laser pointer with subtle guides.
There's a difference .. a big difference.
While viewing the streamed Rio activities, you were in the center of things and the athletes were pushing themselves to the limit around you.
But drop into Jurassic World or Fox's The Martian VR Experience and you immediately immerse yourself in the scene and the action. You can almost feel the hot breath of the dinosaur. You begin to sweat moving the solar panels before the sandstorm hits you. You can hear, feel the sounds in you and all around you.
Immersive VR - A well-produced VR film puts the viewer right in the center of the action so he/she can feel all of the experiences.
That's VR!
Right now, only a few in the industry are focused on mastering 360 video and VR. Most content shooters and producers are still focused on the broader audience and their hunger for 4K HDR (high dynamic range) creative work.
Why?
Several reasons.
Its about artistic development and the creative folks figuring out the best way to give you an experience that is more than just seeing a flat film in 360 degrees. This takes a long time.
Theres a big gap that needs to be filled to develop convincing and truly immersive VR films. Even Nick and Lewis agree that it's goin
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...
The Olympics Streams Aren't VR, But They Are Paving The Way posted: 22/08/2016 
