Sony’s Flip Competitor Spins 360-degree Footage
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Nearly every camera maker has their own Flip-style pocket camcorder, and by and larger they’re all the same. Sony’s Bloggie, though, ups the stakes, becoming the first consumer camcorder to record full, 360-degree panoramic footage.

In the box with the Bloggie is a small lens accessory which snaps onto the existing lens, which itself swivels 270 degrees. The accessory then allows the camera to record all its surroundings while remaining completely stationary. The structure of the lens is remarkably simple: it’s just an upward-facing deep fisheye, which allows it to reflect and record all the surrounding angles at once.

On the camera’s 2.4-inch LCD, the footage appears as a ring. With the bundled computer software, however, you can unwrap imported video into a straight 360-degree panoramic shot–or keep it in donut form, if you like.

Sony’s Flip Competitor Spins 360-degree Footage

Sony Bloggie On-Screen Panoramic Footage

The Bloggie records high-def video at either full 1080p or 720p and captures five-megapixel stills. It supports both SD cards and Memory Stick.

The Bloggie MHS-PM5K with lens accessory kit is available now for $190.

PopSci at CES

Corinne Iozzio
Corinne Iozzio

Corinne Iozzio is the former Editor-in-Chief of Popular Science. In that role, she oversaw an award-winning crew of science journalists—both editors and writers—who are obsessed with shining a light on the thousands of ways science and technology transform our lives daily. She lives in Washington Heights in New York City (or, as she affectionately refers to it, “Upstate Manhattan”) with her partner, an ever-expanding collection of vintage hand-blown glass, and a talkative tuxedo cat hellbent on knocking it all to pieces.

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