The Sling, by 24/7, is part of the company’s new Traffic lineup of bags. The idea was to create an urban style that’s still discreet. I tried out The Sling, which looks like a backpack but has the one-shoulder design favored by protest photographers and others who prefer to keep the camera accessible but stashed inside. The bag opens at the top, but also at the side, allowing you to grab your camera without taking the bag off.
I like that the bag is really lightweight. You can tell it’s ready for weather and the abuse it might take while being dragged around town or even on a hike in the woods. It’s light, and Traffic is an affordable line of products, but the Sling feels tough in the right spots.
The use of 360-video for news and documentary storytelling is about to explode, in my opinion, and camera manufacturers are betting for that to happen. However, there aren’t yet a lot of 360-video solutions available on the market that I like. Many are too expensive (got 60 grand), produce low quality footage (Ricoh Theta), require too much stitching in post-production (rigs with multiple GoPros), or have no set release date yet (Nikon KeyMission and Samsung Gear 360).
The little-known Insta360 that I stumbled upon last month proves to be the best option right now for creating news and documentary 360-video. It’s a crowdfunded camera from a Chinese company Shenzhen Arashi Vision Co., Ltd. It retails for about $600 right now, which is very reasonable.
I’ve had the opportunity to test the camera out on a couple of shoots and have been happy with the results. I’m still learning how to edit and put together sophisticated stories, but initial clips are extremely easy to process and upload to YouTube or Facebook.
The internal microphone is serviceable, and worked well for a Bernie Sanders political rally in Seattle recently. See a sample 360-video clip from that event below.
The camera works by using two lenses; one fisheye lens on each side of the camera. The lenses are 230° and direct your scene onto Dual Sony 8MP CMOS Sensors. The footage is stitched automatically as you shoot and recorded onto a SD card. Live streaming is supposedly possible with an ultra-fast internet connection but I haven’t tested that yet. I don’t believe the camera can accept memory cards with a capacity higher than 32GB right now, but I was able to record for over an hour at the Bernie Sanders rally without issue.
The specs of the Insta360 camera are great, but not mind-blowing. You’ve got 4K, which really is the bare minimum for 360-video at this point. When you think about wrapping all those pixels around a spherical field of view, 4K isn’t as high as it seems. A lot of people using GoPro rigs are doing so to get 6K, 8K, or more.
The camera has no viewfinder, but it has a great mobile app. With its built-in wifi, I can connect with my iPhone easily and control every important detail of my shots, from the color temperature, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, etc. The manual controls are easy and great. Android phones are also supported.
The camera comes shipped in a nice custom little padded carrying case with a 32GB Kingston SD card, charger, tripod adapter, lens cloth, and a few necessary cords.
The camera is not too heavy and is about the size of a Zoom H4n audio recorder, which I lug around in my camera bag often. The exact specs are 2.9 x 6.2 x 1.9" and it weighs in at just under one pound.
It was a bit of an adventure springing for this camera from an unknown company … and it’s technically a beta version, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised. If you don’t mind looking at a Chinese menu after updating the firmware, there are no real issues to report. This is a very exciting time for filmmaking and visual journalism, so I hope I can help you decide if you’re ready to jump into 360-video with a camera like the Insta360.
Do you love virtual reality or have some interest in its potential for journalistic use? The best place to start, without paying a dime, is by downloading a few apps on your mobile device. Try these out, explore a little bit, and see what you think. You don’t need a virtual reality headset or even the affordable Google Cardboard viewer to experience VR videos on your phone. Just download the apps and view the videos. If you do have Google Cardboard or a similar VR viewer, you can use those with most of these apps, too. I didn’t include the two most obvious apps, because you probably already have them, but make sure to try 360-degree videos on Facebook and YouTube. If you haven’t noticed yet, you can already view VR on these apps.
Vrse (iOS + Android) These are the folks behind some of the bigger New York Times VR projects that received a lot of attention lately. This app features the NYT projects such as The Displaced, but you can also find the short horror fiction piece Catatonic. A fun one to watch after you’ve scarred yourself with the horror film is Lucy Walker’s A Short History of Cuban Dance, which debuted at Sundance.
Littlstar (iOS + Android) This one is a bit more exciting. Their plan seems to be to become the Instagram of VR. You can make a profile, upload VR videos, like VR videos, scroll through a timeline, etc. You can already find videos from big names like ABC, NPR, the Kansas City Royals, etc. It will take some time to feel more authentic once actual, like, real people start sharing more content.
Vrideo (iOS + Android + Samsung Gear VR) Vrideo seems very similar to Littlstar but I would say it leans toward a YouTube feel. Yes, you can like and follow people, but it seems to be less of a community and more of a collection of channels. They use the term “subscribers” instead of “followers” (Littlstar uses “followers”) so maybe that’s why I’m getting the YouTube vibe.
RYOT (iOS + Android) RYOT is a news site that donates a portion of its earnings to non-profit causes. They have a VR app with two main sections: “Films” and “360 News.” As of today, the News section was filled with Iowa caucus content (even though today is Super Tuesday) but it’s safe to say they are invested in VR news since it accounts for 50% of their app’s categories! The Films section has a great documentary feel to it. Unlike the other apps, you don’t get much of a corporate branding influence, and one of the projects is a five minute collaboration with the Associated Press on “The Jungle,” the infamous refugee encampment in Calais, France.
Jaunt (iOS + Android) Jaunt is another slick one with travel, documentary, and corporate content mixed together. You can watch a funny promo for Zoolander 2, a Disneyland 60 promo, NHL hockey content, or a North Face piece shot in Nepal. CBS and ABC also make appearances in this app. Judging by all of the branded logos, there must be a fair amount of money flowing through this content, and probably the app. I assume that is a good sign for the app’s staying power, but as a source for news and information, it doesn’t have the same distinctive vibe as something like RYOT, or the next two apps.
WSJ (iOS + Android + Oculus Rift + Samsung Gear VR) The Wall Street Journal app is kind of convenient in that if you already have the regular news app on your phone, you can just open it up and scroll down to the “Virtual Reality” tab. Click on a few videos and learn about how Ikea rugs are made in India, etc. Pretty cool!
NYT VR (iOS + Android) I credit The New York Times with bringing VR journalism to the mainstream when it released The Displaced, an in-depth feature produced by NYT Magazine, along with free Google Cardboard viewers bundled into subscribers’ Sunday Times last November. The NYT VR app is nice, but single publications like NYT and WSJ are going to have a hard time keeping me coming back when they are so slow to add new content. Hopefully soon, budgets will swell with all of that post-Spotlight Oscar journalism love from viewers and advertisers 🙂 Hey, a guy can hope, right … ?
I recently assisted the talented crew at Quartz, which is a new and quickly growing news portal packed full of talent poached from other top publications. They’re making a name for themselves with a weird, awesome news app and their fresh, interesting videos. Last week, we visited the office of Bill Gates to hear about his upcoming annual letter, which was finally released today.
Here are three videos from that day’s shoot: Clean Energy, India, and Africa. Quartz does a great job with its video animations.
