How to make a VR 360 degree video for YouTube

Fracton

Fracton

0
Here are the steps to make a VR 360 degree video with Cheetah3D and upload it to YouTube. From YouTube you can view the video in a VR headset or in a browser with controls that let you look in any direction.

1) Create your content

Create your scene as an animation.

• Set the camera type to Panorama.
• Set the render frame size to 8192 x 4096 (you can use a smaller frame size but it may be blurrier)
• Use 30 fps for the animation (default)
• Save the movie.

2) Prepare for upload

• Edit your 360 movie to add sound etc. using Apple Motion or other movie editing software that has a 360 degree mode (optional)
• Download Google's metadata injection tool from a link on this page

https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/6178631?hl=en&ref_topic=9257783

• Open your movie with the tool, select spherical 360, then click the inject button to save the new video. The metadata is required for YouTube to recognize your video as a VR 360 degree video.

3) Upload your video to YouTube. It may take as long as 48 hours for the higher resolution versions of the movie to be available on YouTube.

4) View the movie in YouTube

• If you have a Playstation VR headset download the YouTube app on the PS4. Turn on the PSVR headset. When you run the YouTube app choose VR mode. Search for and play the movie. The VR effect is amazing if you are new to VR like me.

• You can watch the VR video in a regular browser on your Mac or PC. Dragging the cursor in the movie lets you look in any direction even when the video is paused.

Here is an example I created (movie below the image).

chebyshev_3d.jpg


I imported a 3D model of a fractal I created with my free fractal program Fracton (http://www.fracton.org). Then I added a circle spline object which was used to fly the camera around the scene. On the PS4 you can search for Chebyshev 3D Fractal in the YouTube app. On a Mac or PC you can view the embedded movie below. Click the full screen icon for a larger view.

 
Last edited:
Thanks for the tutorial! (y)
I was wondering if I could make a 360 degree video in C3D and then I saw your thread. I didn't expect it to be that easy. Metadata Injector doesn't run on my older Mac, but I've tried Python. I have no idea what that is, but it works. :giggle:
This was just a very short test with the fly to see if I could do it, but maybe I can do something useful with it someday. Now I'm happy that I can make 360 degree videos. :D

The quality is not optimal. I reduced the size of the file and converted it. The rendering for the 8 sec. in the recommended minimum size (7168x3584) took 4 days at 30fps and the exported film had 4 GB. That was a bit much.

 
Wow, there is so much to see there. I paused the movie and looked around. There are lots of nice details from the barrels on the ground to the mountains in the distance. I can even see the interior of the building through the windows on the side. If would be great fun to see the whole movie.

Martin mentioned he is considering adding a true 3D camera to C3D. It works similar to 360 degree video except there is a image for each eye and you get depth information. The end of the movie with the fly in the bush would really make it feel like you are there in the bush.
 
Fracton said:
Wow, there is so much to see there. I paused the movie and looked around. There are lots of nice details from the barrels on the ground to the mountains in the distance. I can even see the interior of the building through the windows on the side. If would be great fun to see the whole movie.

Martin mentioned he is considering adding a true 3D camera to C3D. It works similar to 360 degree video except there is a image for each eye and you get depth information. The end of the movie with the fly in the bush would really make it feel like you are there in the bush.
Click to expand...


You mean the whole film in 360 degrees ? :unsure: I would love to do that, but I think I would need a few more Macs to build my own little render farm. :LOL:
 
This could also be useful in generating .hdr radiance files for original backgrounds. Can Cheetah render high dynamic range, or do we render multiple with varying exposure values and merge them in another app as described here?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top