Hi! I'm Carolyn from TimefireVR.
We're the founders of Hypatia, a virtual metropolis.
We also do 360 video and this
tutorial is about our process including
filming, stitching, and exporting.
If you like what you see
subscribe for future videos.
The Freedom 360 rig looks like this.
We use GoPro Hero4 black cameras.
These rigs are usually recommended for
live streaming purposes because they are specially
designed to optimize cable management
but of course they take videos and
photos as well.
Keeping your stuff organized is very important since
you're dealing with six cameras.
The rig has numbers but the micro SD cards and
cameras do not, so label each camera and
its card with a marker or tape just to
help keep everything together.
Charge the six cameras to full battery and make
sure each camera has a micro SD card.
Turn on the cameras by pressing the
large silver button on the front.
The camera will flash red a couple of times
and you'll see the screen come on.
You can turn on the cameras Wi-Fi connection
to a remote control by pressing the
silver mode button on the front until
you get to SETUP.
Press the record button on the top
to go into the SETUP menu.
The first option is Wi-Fi so press the
record button once to select it.
Press the record button again to turn the
Wi-Fi from off to on.
To pair a camera with a remote turn on the remote by
pressing the lower left button.
Turn on the camera go to the SETUP menu and into
the Wi-Fi menu.
Scroll down to PAIR
and select it with the top record button.
Scroll down to Wi-Fi RC and select it with the
top record button.
The two arrows and flashing blue light mean that the camera
is ready to be paired to the remote.
Pick up the remote and click and hold the
wrench icon to activate pairing mode.
The remote will also show two arrows
while they are pairing.
From here you can press the record button on the
remote to start recording with the camera.
You can repeat this process to
sync all cameras to the remote.
If they're all flashing blue, then they're
all ready to pick up the Wi-Fi signal
from the remote control.
These are the camera settings we use to record 360 video.
For 6 camera rigs stitching is pretty much
impossible in the 16:9 format.
So, use 4:3.
Other than the 4:3 ratio,
feel free to experiment with other settings.
Press the small black button on the side
of the camera and use the silver MODE
button on the front to scroll down to
the aspect ratio.
Use the record button on the top to cycle through the options.
The optimal setting is 2.7K, 4:3 ratio.
It is also recommended to have
Protune mode turned on.
We're just using this regular camera tripod for now.
The rig can screw into the top like this.
Like many tripods,
this will leave a rather large black shape at
the nadir or bottom of all the 360 videos.
We can cover it up with our logo in a black circle.
We'll discuss how to do
this later in Premiere Pro with the
plug-in Mettle SkyBox 2D Viewer.
When you're at the location where you want to
record and your camera is on the tripod
you can start recording by pressing the
red record button on each camera
individually or use the remote to
activate all cameras simultaneously.
So at the beginning just after you've pressed
record on all the cameras you should do
an audio or motion sync to help the
cameras sync up later in the stitching process.
Another type of motion sync is
to cover the rig with a bag, then remove the bag.
Audio sync has worked the best for us.
If you can see the camera, then you'll be in the footage.
If you don't want to be seen,
then hide around a corner and wait.
It's also possible to remove people
and tripods with Adobe After Effects or
Photoshop but we won't be covering that
in this particular tutorial.
Parallax is two ghost-like images that appear
slightly off from one another.
In this image you can see some parallax
happening on the headphones, as well as
up here on the computer.
This is because this was the line between the two
cameras on the rig.
If it was important to see information on that computer screen,
it would be wise to have one of
the cameras point directly at the
computer screen, instead of the screen
being between two of the cameras on the rig.
The headphones are getting an extra
dose of parallax since they're so close
to the camera.
It's advisable for actors to stand back several feet
from the GoPro rig to avoid parallax on
some part of their bodies.
The best and easiest way to get a consistent stitch
is to create a template for your rig
that you can use as the basis for all your stitches.
If you record inside an office, with these types of ceilings for example,
it will be difficult for the
stitching programs to identify matching points,
because this ceiling doesn't have
many unique details to match.
The pattern on the ceiling basically just all looks the same.
For this reason, if you are shooting
with the goal of creating a new template,
then make it easy on yourself and shoot
outside or in a place with a lot of
unique details that will be easy for the
program to connect between cameras.
To stop recording, press the record button
on the remote or turn off each camera individually.
If you use the remote to
stop recording, then hold the off button
on the remote,
then all six cameras will turn off.
Create folders for each camera.
You can also create folders for Premiere Pro
or any other programs and files that
you want to keep organized here.
If you have multiple takes, then create
folders for each take inside the Cam folder.
Import the footage into
the correct camera and take folders and
rename the file to reflect the camera
number and take number.
Drag each video into VideoStitch.
Click on the Synchronization tab.
Look for the area in the beginning where you clapped for
the audio sync or twisted the rig around
for the motion sync.
If you pressed the record buttons individually instead of
with a remote then be sure to leave
enough room in the timeline section for
all the cameras to play the sound.
If you did a motion sync, then press the
motion sync button instead of the audio button.
We won't see an audio track in the
timeline like we would in Premiere Pro
so just look for the clap in the footage.
Note that it's normal for all the photos
to be on top of each other in VideoStitch's output tab
after the synchronization.
Until after you do the calibration.
There are two options for calibration.
If you already have a template for your camera rig,
then this is where you would import it and
apply it to the footage.
Go to Window > Calibrate > Import Template > Browse or Recent
Once you have a template, you might not even
need PTGui anymore and can do the
calibration using only VideoStitch.
You could also see if the Automatic
Calibration works for your footage.
However, if you get some strange results
like this one, you might need to export to PTgui.
In VideoStitch, go to
Edit > Extract Stills To...
and create a new folder for the stills.
Remember to save the VideoStitch project.
Open PTgui and click on Load images...
and find that folder where
you extracted the stills from VideoStitch.
Now you'll get the EXIF data box
where PTGui will ask for camera lens data.
Focal length can be around 15 to 17.2
Crop factor 1.
I read on the VideoStitch forums that
these numbers don't be to be accurate.
They are starting points for image alignment
and they are updated when you
add control points and optimize the template.
Press OK and click on Align images...
This is another spot where you could apply a template.
If you don't have a template,
your image might look strange
like a blob, upside-down, or all the
images on top of each other.
If one of the images is upside down then go into
the Image Parameters tab and change the
Roll to negative or positive.
Whatever the opposite is in your case.
In the example here, add a negative sign in
front of the 83.8094.
Here's the result.
You can also tweak the numbers to get it just right.
If no control points exist,
click the blue "generate control points"
in the other Control Points window.
Sometimes you can shift > click and drag
to highlight an area on an image and
then right-click in that box to generate control points.
Sometimes it works,
sometimes it doesn't.
You may need to add more control points
between images if PTGui doesn't already connect them.
Click on the left image,
for example camera number two, and find the exact
similar point in the second image on the right
(in this case, camera number three).
It might be difficult with camera number five,
which is the one camera pointing upward.
Especially if it's on a typical office
building ceiling or clear blue sky.
It just all looks the same so it's hard for the
program to pinpoint the right spot.
The best thing to do in this case is to set
points on the corners of the lights.
If you're having difficulty finding the
matching point between the left and right images,
in this case maybe you're
not sure which edge of the ceiling light
this is supposed to be here,
then hover the mouse cursor over the full panorama
in the editor window.
Little crosshairs will also appear over the corresponding
areas in the two images and the Control Points window
If there's one spot that's
just not lining up then go to the Mask Tab.
Choose the image that has the
best-looking area
and use the green masking tool.
This will make that camera's image more visible.
It kind of hides the other camera.
Hopefully, by adding control points and messing
around with the various tab options, you
might have a stitch that looks pretty darn good.
Even if it has some errors
like messed up ceiling lights, that's okay.
We'll save this is a template and you
can always update or save new templates
as you find more settings that work for
your specific situation, cameras, and rig.
So save the project as a template
and open VideoStitch again.
Go to Window > Calibration > Import Template and browse for
the panorama template that you just
saved from PTGui.
Is the ceiling too dark?
One of the cameras overexposed?
The Color Correction tab can help.
Pick a good frame in the timeline (meaning, a frame
where your face isn't up-close looking at the record button)
and click on Adjust Sequence.
In the timeline you can adjust
the red or blue and exposure
on individual cameras.
"Input 5" just means camera five, like in PTGui.
You can also mess around with the Color Correction Tab
to see if it helps with your footage.
If you press play and the color keeps
flickering strangely, then try clicking on
Adjust On Current Frame.
Move ahead a couple frames, click it again,
move ahead a few more frames...
Just until it starts looking right.
If you've added keyframes here and there
and you press play and then you find
that there's suddenly a weird animation
of the entire panorama, moving strangely
as you scrub through the timeline,
then it's probably due to some keyframes that
were moved somewhere or accidentally created.
Maybe delete some of them or all of them
and start over again.
If the horizon looks crooked, you can fix it by
clicking on the Orientation button.
This will bring up a blue grid and you can
click and drag until the image looks correct.
Exporting is done in the Process tab in
the upper right corner of the screen
click Browse to choose where you want
the file to be saved.
Note that the H.264 video encoder
does not support resolutions higher than 4096.
The H.264 codec can be used
for resolutions up to 4096 x 2018.
For a larger size, like if you want to export
8k from Premiere later,
choose the JPEG sequence format and click "Set optimal size."
Then we'll import that into Premiere Pro.
Remember to save!
In Premiere Pro, import the JPEGs from VideoStitch
as an image sequence.
From here, you can make a sequence and do some more
color correction if you want.
If you've got a big ol' tripod on the nadir of
your footage, it can be easily covered up
with a circular logo.
In the timeline of your sequence, click on the logo layer,
go to the effects panel, type in "Mettle" and
apply Project 2D.
At this point, if window showing the footage suddenly
goes black and you no longer see the logo or
any footage at all, then this might be
because your logo is too large.
Take it into Photoshop and make it smaller, and then
bring it back into Premiere and try it again.
Go to the Effect Controls panel to
the Mettle plugin.
You can adjust the scale if you want but the main thing
is to set the x axis to 90 degrees.
Here's an example of what it would look like
in the YouTube video.
For more tutorials on this,
see the link in the description box.
Let's export an 8k video
from Premiere.
In the export window, choose QuickTime format.
I have this preset saved as "8k 360 VR."
Set the video codec to MPEG4 video.
Match source. Quality 100.
Render at maximum depth.
Key frame every 30 frames.
Data rate 80,000
Video is VR, monoscopic.
Down below, check Use maximum render quality.
Under AUDIO... uncompressed,
48,000 hertz.
Under PUBLISH, you can upload automatically to YouTube.
Just log in here and the video's title would be
just the same as the output name above.
We used to need a separate metadata
spacial injector app but it's no longer
required if you're using
Premiere Pro CC 2017, which has some
VR tools built in.
Once, I tried to change the title of a video on YouTube
coming from Premiere, before the render
was 100% complete and it
seemed to ruin the upload to YouTube.
The render was done and saved on the
computer, but I needed to upload it to
YouTube through a browser, then.
So wait until after the YouTube video is fully
rendered and uploaded from Premiere before
making changes on YouTube.
So now you have a video that you can share.
If you like what you see,
feel free to subscribe to see future videos.
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