Lucid, maker of the stereoscopic point-and-shoot LucidCam camera, is partnering with RED, the professional-use camera company, to produce a 180-degree stereoscopic camera for 8K video and image capture.

The camera is said to give users the ability to capture 8K video and picture, and convert to RED’s four view (4V) “holographic” file format in real-time while allowing them to “shoot like professionals with dynamically adjustable lens distances for the best 3D focus and zoom.”

The company says that the system can also integrate RED’s new holographic phone, RED Hydrogen One, which will allow users to view 3D/4V content both live and in post similar to a viewfinder, and also view the resultant file without the need of a VR/AR headset. Video and images captured with the camera can also be viewed on monitors, and both VR and AR headsets.

Image courtesy Lucid & RED

The camera has a typically RED industrial design, but contains two hardware-synced 4K cameras which make use of a beam splitter to capture and convert the output to 8K 4V (.h4v) files. “Once the content is created, all the high resolution 3D/4V videos and images can be distributed on YouTube and Facebook as well as through RED’s curated content universe,” the companies say in a press release.

“Having RED as a partner allows us to combine the best of both worlds – the highest resolution and quality hardware from RED with the most advanced software, our 3D Fusion Technology,” said Han Jin, CEO and co-founder, Lucid.

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The new camera, Lucid and RED say, “meets the need of a large, combined audience,” which likely means pro and prosumers looking to distribute 180-degree 3D video across the multitude of supported devices.

“This partnership allows us for the first time to deliver the highest-quality 3D capture to our customers, and now they can view the content immediately in 3D/4V without headsets,” said Jin. “At a time when two of the biggest challenges in the industry have been resolution and easy viewing of 3D content, we believe this is the solution everyone has been waiting for.”

Lucid and RED say the new camera, which is still unnamed, will be available at some point in Q4. At the time of this writing, no pricing information is available, although it will be sold through RED and its reseller channels.

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Scott Hayden
Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • xebat

    Put a binaural microphone on that thing and you got yourself the ultimate camera for VR porn.

    • dk

      being Red …..probably an add on that costs close to the price of the camera :P

  • Lucidfeuer

    No 360°, no thanks. Although this is getting somewhere because I trust RED to make a quality camera, without the still overdue asynchronous video buffering codec virtual video is going nowhere.

  • Great news. I already have the Lucidcam and being 180 degrees is perfect. You can shoot as easy as 2d video without previous planning to not block camera with your body. You also get more quality using 2K 180 degrees than 4K 360 degrees (a lot more, just compare 2k footage from lucidcam -now is 4k capable, even better- with vuze 360 4k camera, vuze is horrible!)
    And being 4 view format I think Red will help consolidate this format for cinema and consumer

    • dk

      it would be neat if someone compares the lucid cam to the mirage solo cam

  • oompah

    What they should have done
    is to include a Lidar scanner
    & also collect 3d point data
    in order to convert the imageries into
    3d data (xyz+color/texture)
    which could be played like in a game
    that would be true 3d

    • dk

      it’s not that easy with that data the camera will see more or less this https://assets.pcmag.com/media/images/228248-what-kinect-sees.jpg?width=694&height=694&boxFit=y and nothing in the shadows of the objects……it won’t look like a high quality game if u just add an expensive lidar to it
      ……..but we r slowly moving in that direction

      • kyle

        What depth camera is that?

        • dk

          it’s simpler than lidar …the link says it’s a kinect …..I’m just saying that adding an expensive lider to this camera won’t automatically result in a perfect photogrametry of a room

      • oompah

        Ths can be solved easily by :
        1. Having more than one set of cameras simultaneously capturing the dynamic images
        2. Above pic is not applied with color info(the regular picture pixels over depth)
        3. So when both 1+2 are applied (& processed) u get voxel instead of pixels i.e an imagery that has volumetric 3D pixels that can be viewed from many angles and at various depths
        4. Instead of sending huge raw data to users, the servers can process & produce images at various sharpness for various depth for a particular point of view (or 2 for VR) & then only send it across to the viewer.

        I know it is ambitious but is different than simply dumping the data to user. Future is for VR & this is the way VR is to exist for real world imageries.
        Imagine , u r watching Yellow stone geysers or Hawaii eruptions & watching the 3D videos of people in VR and then you can also move around among people & even have a closer look from many angles as if a part of crowd yet non-existent

        • dk

          yes it becomes a whole super expensive super complicated studio setup and the result is not quite as good as a game rendering ……but yeah eventually it will be more convenient to do …..also another possibility is a light field camera recording from multiple spots in the room and using that data to put together the room
          https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/H9CGoho_H9M3h1en5n23BuaIo_I=/0x0:661×300/1200×800/filters:focal(201×88:305×192):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/59030915/ShuttleOddityLoop_Compressed_15fps.0.gif
          also just having the light field recording from those sports is pretty cool even if u can’t move too much in every spot the camera has been