Olympus' Omni-directional Camera Sensor Makes Pictures Look Like HAL-9000 Clones

If the imaging group at Olympus has its way, we might soon start to take pictures with omni-directional cameras. This will either lead to panoramic, life-altering photo perspectives, or it just might make pictures unnecessarily complicated and so dizzying as to be useless.

Yesterday, Olympus' Future Creation Lab announced a new 360 CCD sensor/lens combo prototype that will allow photographers to take pictures of 360-degree views. These types of sensors have a curved symmetrical axis, and are about 1.18 inches in diameter.

The way they work is that as light passes through the curved lens when taking a picture, the internal reflection is captured in a wide-angle 360-degree limited view, allowing for a 'full' perspective of a single image. It's assumed that the sensor in development will be able change the magnification and size of the viewfinder's perspective. In a way, this is just a different approach to adjusting the depth of field.

The omni-directional system is also defined as axisymmetrical, but the sci-fi inclined will inevitably call it something else: Pictures that look like HAL-9000.