Beware of producers fake "8K", "7K" and "6K"
Most sites selling "8K", "7K" and "6K" are actually upscaled 5.4K videos bringing no visual improvements. However, content creators want to use fish-eye technology because alpha channel passthrough and depth maps only work with fish-eye. And this way, the original FOV of the video is preserved. Our users agree - over on our forum, one user said:
"Fish-eye is one of the main reasons why I'm still subbed to SLR - it's the only way we can get the best closeup missionary experience. I love how it makes me feel like I'm right there in the action."
This post will continue to be updated as new information emerges... Last update: Apr 2023
New 6K videos are coming to SLR in the highest resolution possible thanks to SLR projection meshes based on the camera lens profiles. Now, videos are released in the original ZCam K2 Pro sensor resolution, rendering a 200º 5800x2770px side by side stereo image that is marketed as 6K. Producers using conventional equirectangular projection are cutting it down to 180º 5400x2700px.
The red circle in the image shows how much extra visual footage is gained with fish-eye vs equirectangular. Watch the picture in VR in the DeoVR player or the SLR app and make sure to keep ‘_MKX200’ in the filename. That extra field of view adds an incredible amount of immersion as it prevents the viewer from going outside of the visible area with the natural head movements we do all the time. Another advantage of fish-eye is that fewer renderings are done in the workflow, meaning better image quality.
Check Lauren Phillips “Hard Sell” movie in fish-eye vs equirectangular. There are more fish-eye videos coming. Every producer can also get their videos in 6K fish-eye with this Mistika Boutique tutorial.
It is worth noting that some producers create ‘6000x3000px’ (“6K”), ‘7200x3600px’ (“7K”) or even ‘8000x4000px’ (“8K”) equirectangular videos from 5400x2700px 180º equirectangular. These are merely upscaled images boosted with junk pixels that have no value for the viewer. Instead “6K”/“7K” and "8K" tag is just a selling point. Things get even worse for those getting 5K version of the video, that would otherwise be the original resolution, but it becomes of lower quality because it’s downscaled from the upscaled 8K files. See for yourself: upscaled 8K video vs original quality 5K footage. Upscaling if done right works really well for low res videos like 360p or 720p, but it's useless the way it's now for 4K or higher resoultion content. Only in April 2022 the first 8K VR video cameras emerged and now you can enjoy TRUE 8K 60FPS videos.
It's thought that fake 7K/8K emerged with the release of the ZCam K2 Pro camera, which offered enhanced image quality. Having the same sensor resolution as its predecessor the K1 Pro, the K2 Pro is showing much better image quality due to better sensor specs. Also, the K2 Pro offers 10-bit color vs the K1 Pro’s 8-bit color, has better performance in low light, better HDR, native h265 support and more. Some producers were tempted to overstate their camera upgrade with false advertising.
On the SLR website we tag 5400px equirectangular videos as “5K”. Videos submitted by producers as “6K”/”7K” and “8K” are tagged accordingly in the video, yet they aren't shown in our 6K and 8K feeds. We’re unsure of the best way to deal with this issue. Ideally, we would like every VR video producer to render their videos at the original sensor resolution and not upscale.
Commentators have mentioned the useful impact of AI machine learning (ML) upscaling suggesting many examples on Youtube. However, none of the “6K”/“7K”/”8K” producers suggested the use of ML. Video upscaling is a basic feature of any video editing software and does not enhance image quality. You end up requiring more bandwidth, longer download times and your headset or desktop computer heating up for no reason. You can join forum discussion at https://forum.sexlikereal.com/d/2422-upscale-brings-no-quality-improvements-proof/
While ML requires huge processing power and time to effectively upscale flat videos, it still can’t be used for high resolution stereoscopic videos because of convergence plane requirements. Simply put, ML would have to also respect the stereoscopic disparity between the left and right eye and the tech is simply not there yet. And once this tech does emerge it would be right and proper to tag it as “ML or AI upscaled”.
Please let us know your thoughts on this issue.
Update. Around the time of this blog post, CzechVR released an 8K video, believed to be natively recorded in 30FPS and later interpolated to 60FPS.
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