I’m pretty sure that when Jonas Pfeil told people he wanted to make a panoramic camera ball they thought it was just the ramblings of an ambitious student at the Technical University of Berlin. Well, he (and a few other researchers) actually did it. The 3D-printed, padded ball is about the size of a grapefruit with 36 fixed-focus, 2 megapixel mobile phone cameras that can shoot a 360-degree panoramic view when thrown upwards. The accelerometer sensor inside measures speed when thrown and calculates when the ball will reach the highest point.
Once it does, all 36 lenses create one seamless shot. Photos can be downloaded quickly via USB and the panoramic views can be seen with the custom viewer. There’s some buzz about picture quality with the ball, while some are touting that there are no ghosting issues and minimized blurriness, others are noticing that there could be some improvement in the panoramic stitching. (Take a look at the video below and decide for yourself.) The ball camera still needs some investors, so it will be showing at Siggraph Asia 2011 in December.
Via: Extreme Tech
Credit: Jonas Pfeil
