The VR market is yet to mature, so expensive devices are expected, but Nokia may be asking for too much.
Will studios pay $60,000 to buy a VR camera? Well, Nokia thinks so. The Finnish company has priced its recently-unveiled spherical VR camera, Nokia Ozo, for the amount mentioned above. The Ozo has been built to shoot 3D films and games for usage in virtual reality headsets. It can record stereoscopic 3D videos, along with spatial audio through eight synchronised shutters. It also has integrated microphones and can operate wirelessly, storing data as a single file. The Nokia Ozo can also capture and broadcast videos live, on supported channels. The camera is, of course, among the professional cameras used for shooting VR videos.
Virtual reality has been picking up the pace recently, with companies like Google, Facebook, Sony and HTC investing in the development of VR headsets. While Facebook acquired Oculus, which is amongst the pioneers in the industry, Sony and HTC have both announced their own VR headsets. Sony’s headset, originally codenamed Project Morpheus, is called the Playstation VR, while HTC’s collaboration with gaming giant Valve, brought the HTC Vive. In fact, we recently tried the HTC Vive and found it quite immersive, but lacking the right kind of content.
The Nokia Ozo looks to solve this content problem in VR right now. Shooting real life 3D videos effectively is no easy task, and while there are certain solutions available, the Nokia Ozo has been touted to be more advanced than present solutions. That said, while specialised equipment for VR videos are expected to be expensive, Nokia’s price tag could be a tad too expensive for companies. Of course, prices in this market will go down as sales volumes start increasing.
Incidentally, Ozo isn’t a one-of-a-kind camera, either. The Odyssey is a VR camera that was created by GoPro in collaboration with Google. At $15,000, the Odyssey is much cheaper than the Nokia Ozo, but the pricing is still considered to be high, which puts Nokia’s pricing in perspective.
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