Google is building a cinema-grade VR camera with IMAX

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. -- Google wants to take VR all the way to Hollywood.

Last year the company launched its platform for creating 360-degree video, called Jump, and since then Hollywood studios have come calling, Google's head of VR, Clay Bavor, said at the Google I/O developer conference on Thursday. He also said Google will be working with IMAX to build a cinema-grade VR camera system.

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Bavor didn't reveal any details of the camera or technology, but presumably it would be a step above the GoPro Odyssey, the first Jump camera, which cobbles together 16 individual GoPros within a Google-designed rig. That camera uses Google tech to stitch together all the footage into high-res 360-degree video with depth.

That depth is what provides a richer experience when the footage is viewed on a VR headset. Objects appear in 3D, as if they exist in real space, as opposed to seeing a "flat" spherical image. It's not perfect, however -- the viewer can't really move around the environment much at all.

However, high-end VR camera systems like the Lytro Immerge promise at least a limited space that viewers can move in. Presumably Google's cinematic Jump system would do the same, although the Lytro system isn't in the hands of filmmakers yet either.

Google also announced it would partner with Yi, a Chinese action-cam manufacturer, to build an Odyssey-like rig for the company's 4K action camera.

Although cinematic VR is in its infancy, consumer 360-degree cameras are already in the hand of consumers. The Ricoh Theta S captures bare-bones 360 footage, and Samsung's Gear 360 is available in Korea and is coming to the U.S. this summer.

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