The FINANCIAL — Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. on February 21 announced the Samsung Gear 360, a 360-degree camera that lets consumers easily capture, view and share their experiences through spherical video and still images. Relive memorable moments from ski vacations to walking down the aisle to children’s birthday parties from every perspective.
Shoot with Gear 360, edit with select Samsung Galaxy phones, view on the phone or Gear VR and share on social media with friends and family.
During the last year, 360-degree video has experienced explosive growth, with services like Samsung Milk VR and festivals like the 2016 Sundance Film Festival showcasing the best of the new medium. What was once only in the realm of professional filmmakers, Gear 360 can now make it easy for consumers to capture this type of video and imagery. Gear 360 is designed to deliver immersive photos and video at a high resolution (3840 x 1920) that is viewable in 2D via the mobile app or in 360 via the Gear VR, according to Samsung.
“Samsung continues to push the boundaries of the mobile experience to extend beyond the smartphone,” said DJ Koh, President of Mobile Communications Business, Samsung Electronics. “On the heels of last year’s Gear VR release, Gear 360 continues to push the limits on immersive content – providing a visual experience that makes capturing and sharing life’s moments even easier.”
Compact Design with High Performance for Every Activity
With a light and compact, spherical design (weighing only 153 grams), Gear 360 maximizes portability, so consumers can film anywhere—in their home, in the middle of the city, or in the middle of the wilderness. Gear 360 features a user-friendly tripod and also supports the industry standard thread sizes to easily work with a wide selection of accessories and mounts currently available on the market.
Gear 360 is splash-proof and dust resistant and is smaller than a baseball, so it can go almost anywhere, to capture the full sphere of memories. The new camera leverages the best of the Samsung Galaxy experience so users can easily edit and share their videos and pictures via select Galaxy smartphones, and are able to immerse themselves in their own content through Samsung Gear VR, powered by Oculus.
Samsung Gear 360 is equipped with dual fisheye lenses, each with high resolution image sensors, capable of capturing 3840 x 1920, 360-degree video, or 30 megapixel still images. Users can also choose to shoot 180-degree wide angle video and images with only using one side of the camera lens. Built to capture life’s everyday moments, Gear 360 offers Bright Lens F2.0, which creates high resolution images and full panoramic videos even in low-light conditions.
The Galaxy Experience
Gear 360 is compatible with select Samsung smartphones including the newly released Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge. When synced, users will be able to preview their footage in real time, using the phone as a remote. Gear 360 will automatically give users the option to view and save footage on their smartphone, or share it directly to their favorite social channels, while performing a quick and easy stitch of the content to fuse together the two fields of view. All of these features will be available through a dedicated mobile application for download from Google Play. In addition, PC software is available for more in-depth editing capabilities.
Gear 360 will be available in Q2 2016 in select countries. Storage via micro SD card can accommodate cards up to 128 gigabytes in capacity.
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