Today, we are going to review a new 6K 50FPS 3D VR 180 camera right here.
Compared to Canon or Insta360 EVO, this one you don't need to stitch.
You can even edit the VR180 FREE in the cloud using your VR headset. And you can
also go live with it on Pico or a new Meta Quest social app - in 6K 50fps.
This camera is called Calf. We have tested, on a gimbal,
in the legendary Paramount Studio, Hollywood, filming Cinegear 2023.
The camera is as small as a consumer mirrorless. It fits nicely on my new Zhiyun Crane M3S. It is
bigger than Insta360 EVO tho and features TWO 34mm diameter custom fisheye lenses.
They are just slightly smaller than the Canon Dual Fisheye lens.
A camera lens diameter matters because the larger it is, the more light it lets in. The more
light-collecting power, the higher the picture resolution and the brighter the image. A smaller
camera lens, therefore, produces a dimmer picture. The lens size always affects the image quality.
Here are the key specs of Calf.
I will say this video is more a first look of Calf instead of an in-depth review. One thing
that jumps out to me immediately is the ease of use. This camera is designed for Influencers and
live streamers rather than videographers. So it is very easy to use and requires no
stitching or post-production. Everything can be controlled on the super large back LED screen.
It uses Canon LP-6 battery - same as Canon R5. It can attach a USB-C
Mic like the Zoom H3VR for ambisonic capture or a 3.5mm jack, for lav mic like the Rode Wireless Me
It has 4 quarter-inch mounts for accessories on all 4 sides, and it uses regular side SD card.
The design is very minimum, with a full metal body. It does have a fan to keep
the camera cool during livestream. But, it is pretty quiet, even with the fan on.
The back LED also allows stitched 3D video playback in side by side mode. You can even upload
it on their cloud directly and view it immediately inside a VR headset like the Meta Quest. Cut
out the entire post-production workflow. The Meta Quest App, currently on App Lab,
also supports simple VR180 video editing.The idea is to cut out Adobe Premiere or Davinci Resolve
entirely. Edit it in camera or in an app on Meta Quest, Pico, using cloud computing, and release on
VR social media directly, which, hopefully, will be on the upcoming Apple Vision Pro.
Mindblow!
Spatial computing will be the future of social media, and Calf wants to be one of the first.
Let's step back, who is Calf? Well, they are not a nobody. They are actually a branch of
a well-known social media in China - called Changba. Direct translation is Karaoke Club.
They have 600 million registered users and average 10 million active users per month. It is a Karaoke
social media app, kinda like Music.ly - BUT not lip sing, real singing. Now, they want to do
exactly that, livestream VR in the Metaverse. And this is their camera to do so.
When you look at the captured footage, 1 thing that stands out immediately is the missing top and
bottom session. It replaces with this stretch edge pixels things right here. If you film outside like
a blue sky, it will be blended for you really well. But most of the time, for close up, you
will have missing feet. The camera uses the same technique to blend left and right lens as well to
have full 180 instead of a lens mask. So you lose 10 degree top and bottom but gain 10 degrees left
and right. What is that look like in a VR headset? Let's take a look inside my Meta Quest Pro.
This is a direct camera capture in 6K 50fps, H.264 sideload it onto my Meta
Quest Pro. It is the first camera I tested will immediately playback in Meta Quest TV
app without any stitching, transcoding or metadata-injection. And the 6K image
quality in 50fps is just about to saturate 100% of the playback ability of Meta Quest
2 or Pico Neo 4. It looks good! The stereo is very comfortable. It handles close up very good
without making me cross eye. There is absolutely no vertical disparity,
and the stereo is perfectly calibrated in camera level. Even the side is good in the stereo dead
zone. There is a lens blending here but you don't really notice it - so really give us
back that full 180 left and right. The missing top and bottom are slightly distracting. But
it is a small area and does not bother me much. The dynamic range is not as good as Canon - but
it is expected as it is only a 1 over 2.3 inch sensor, not a full frame like the Canon R5C.
50fps looks a lot better when there is close-up motion compared to 30fps. Worth to mention it
is a pain in the butt to shoot 8K 60fps in Canon RAW on the R5C - and most creators settle in 30fps
because the processing is so intensive on Canon RAW 60fps. It is refreshing to know I get 50fps smooth
playback without any post-production. From Camera to VR headset directly.
The camera is not Cheap. It costs $1499 USD. So how is the image quality compare
to Insta360 EVO or the more expensive Canon EOS R5C with the Dual Fisheye lens? Well,
it can not be a Hugh Hou review without side by side comparison, right? Let's take a look.
Here we have our models Keeley and Kimchi. Kimchi mostly just stair at Keeley doing her weird dance.
BTW, Keeley has no idea the camera is rolling. Anyway, from left to right, we have Insta360 EVO,
Calf Camera, Canon R5C. We will provide this side-by-side comparison video link in true 6K
3D VR180 on both YouTube VR and Meta Quest TV. So check it out inside your VR headset.
Let's freezeframe to check it out. Canon R5C def has that cinematic look
and the best image quality. The Calf camera is not as good as the Canon,
but pretty close to it
Let's zoom in on Keeley's face for 300% - you can immediately see that security camera look on
the Insta360 EVO. It is a digital oversharpening artifact common among action cameras. You can see
it better when you pay attention to the outline. See her eyebrows? Evo looks very unnaturally
sharpened, while both Calf and Canon look natural. So, a sharp image never mean a good image.
The Calf camera in auto white balance does make the image overly red and overly saturated—so I
will suggest manual white balance your image and turn down the Contrast and Saturation in
the image style menu. If you go into the Image Style menu - you can really fine-tune your image,
further reduce noise, and even add Image Effect like Black and White here.
Black and White actually look really cool in 3D VR180. Check out our latest
OnStage episode to see the creative use of Black and White in a VR180 music video.
Okay, back to the comparison. Let's check out the side. Kimchi is standing at 170 degrees
point. Let's zoom in 400x times. Evo has even more compression artifacts here. You can clearly see it
on Kimchi's tail. Also Kimchi looks FATTER in EVO.
Sorry, Kimchi. The scale looks correct in Calf and in Canon. But Calf does look darker on the
side. A little bit lens vignetting. Hopefully they can fix it in the production version.
Take a look at the right side, there is a focus chart. Zoom in 400%, Calf camera
is very sharp, wait, it is sharper than Canon? Well, not really. The reason why Canon is soft
here is because the Canon Dual fisheye Lens is a manual lens. I focus it on Keeley's close up,
and the distance chart is technically not focused. It is on purpose to create that cinematic look in
VR180. BUT, it is not good if you do not have someone else to pull focus for you.
Calf, on the other hand, fixed its focus at infinite at Aperture F2.0. So everything is
always in focus. It is great for solo creators who just want to set it and forget about it.
Next, let's look at very far away, the trees outside of the windows.
EVO is losing the color and the details due to heavy compression. Calf can capture both
the color and the detail better. See the RED leaves here, it is totally lost in EVO.
In conclusion, even tho on specs, Calf only have TWO 1 over 2.3 inch SONY IMX 577 small sensors,
its image quality is still pretty good thanks to its very sharp and
very large lens. By giving up the top and bottom 10 degrees,
it gives Calf camera a better sensor coverage so in term, a better image quality overall.
Yes, it is still not as good as Canon, a full-frame sensor camera. But,
you pay what you get. R5C is a lot more expensive than a Calf camera.
Lastly,
I want to demo is their FREE VR180 social media app - now available on Meta Quest App
Lab and SideQuest. It also called Calf. It is like a TikTok but in 3D 180. There are lots of
girls dancing and singing there. I kinda wish I can see more diversity in the uploaded content.
You can give heart to the creator and trigger this animation. You can leave a voice memo
as a comment which is kinda cool. You can even subscribe to the creators for long form contents,
kinda like ONLYFANS, but in VR. Hmmmm... ... One thing unique about it is all the videos
are short - 15 seconds and very scrollable - just like TikTok. Calf wants to make
short-form VR180 popular - which is very different from everyone else.
The young generation really have an attention span of a goldfish, so maybe this format of immersive
content will work? Well, with the release of Apple Vision Pro, we will have a huge demand
for content in this immersive 180 format - so maybe this is one way to meet the demand in a
rapid speed? Well, the future of VR180 is going to be super competitive and exciting.
What I have here is still a pre-production model. I will make a follow up review
when I get my hand on a production unit. So don't forget to subscribe,
hit the notification bell, and give this video a big thumbs up to support Me and Kimchi.
We will also go live in 6K VR180 on Pico using Calf Camera to test
out the livestream features. And I hope to see you inside the Pico VR headset,
for a live review of this camera. I will put the time & date in the comments. See you in VR.