The Samsung Gear 360 Has Competition: Insta360 Nano From China

Insta360 Nano supports live streaming on Facebook (PRNewsFoto/Insta360)

Smaller and Lighter: Insta360 Nano Challenges Gear 360 in the US Market

This is the WOW! bit:

Currently spherical cameras are very costly and may having some technical difficulties with image stitching. Insta360 is priced under 200 dollars, which is considered to be a fairly low-priced product with a huge market potential in personal consumption.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

Unlike the Gear 360, this can work with a variety of phones. The Gear 360 is compatible only with certain Samsung phones.

The Insta360 site — at post time — has info only about the sold-in-China Insta360 4K camera, which is larger but is itself interesting. See the design and specs. The companion software is also interesting.

As usual, Charbax was the first with the news, but it was back in November when VR wasn’t yet on my radar:

Insta360 4K@15fps 360-degree dual-lens Camera

A camera such as this can open video VR prototyping to many people without the expense of buying all of that Samsung hardware (an unlocked S7 is near US$700 alone!).

Previously here:

2016’s Version Of Circa-1970s Super-8 Filmmaking
“Samsung VR” Is Cheaper Than Super-8 Was