Amazon.com: Customer reviews: YI 360 VR Camera Dual-Lens 5.7K HI Resolution Panoramic Camera with Electronic Image Stabilization, 4K in-Camera Stitching

Good but not the most user-friendly for youtube live streaming

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2018

This camera is a blast but I do have some difficulties streaming live to YouTube with it. The system asks me to enable a live stream, which I try to do from my laptop with encoders or on YouTube itself to no avail. The facebook streaming option, on the other hand, worked straight out of the box pretty much. I have not tried streaming to other facebook pages yet. It's not the most user-friendly right now but these issues are software problems that I suspect will improve with time. The video it produces is breathtaking to me. I wish it could stitch the highest res ones automatically and I am unable to stitch them at the moment on my macbook since their software is only for PC right now. I can't wait to see what those would look like.

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Joel

If you have Apple products, forget this camera.

Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2019

Verified Purchase

Having read all of the positive reviews, I was excited to use a 360 camera that "just works". The user interface is decent on the camera but the size was a little larger that what I expected compared to some of its competitors. I liked the replaceable batteries and this came in handy on the day of filming. I updated to the latest firmware (1.1.53) from Yi's website via SD card but neither of my phones were able to connect to this camera over WiFi (neither 2.4G or 5G). One is an iPhone 8 and the other an iPhone X. Not the latest phones, but running the latest OS updates. Tried a connection to an Android phone owned by a friend, and no problem. There is no Mac editing software. You are forced to purchase third party editing/stitching software, or use a PC to edit, and I am not able to interface with the phone for live view or to change settings over iOS. If you have an Android ecosystem, probably a decent camera (not waterproof though). However, if you run Apple, forget it.
I wish I didn't throw away the packaging before my main event otherwise I would be returning this to Amazon. I wasn't disappointed in build quality or packaging. These were good, but for a camera that is essentially unusable for me if I need to activate it remotely, or set up a live view shots, disappointing.

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Jeff

360 video performance of GoPro and Garmin at half the price

Reviewed in the United States on January 26, 2018

Verified Purchase

Update:
I have had to update this review to reflect the fact that not only has Yi long abandoned this camera, it also appears to have been a one and done in the company's one and done venture into consumer 360 video. I now own the insta360 One X and whereas the video quality is not a substantial upgrade, the software and app are incredibly better. I can now stitch 360 video in 5.7k without the frustration of software failure and the Freemotion feature has unleashed creativity. True 5.7k 360 video at $150 is a good deal, but I cannot continue to recommend purchasing a new product that has essentially been discontinued and no longer supported by its manufacturer well before it arrives at your door.

Original review:
Having been extremely satisfied with the performance to cost ratio of my Yi 4K action cam relative to its chief competitors, I had been anxiously awaiting the release of the company’s 360 degree offering and it has not disappointed. No, it doesn’t have all the bells and whistles of the GoPro Fusion or Garmin Virb, but when it comes to the fundamental nature of a cameras intended purpose recording 360 video and capturing 360 photos it easily matches the performance of them despite the $300 lower price tag.

Pros:
*Excellent video quality in 5.7K setting
*Good video quality in 4K setting
*Stitching line is nearly imperceptible and easy using the companion Windows software
*Uses same batteries as Yi 4K, extras are relatively cheap
*Expandable storage up to 128GB (the 32GB Ricoh Theta V will quickly fill up)
*Only require one MicroSD card (unlike GoPro Fusion)
*Great low light performance relative to other 360 cameras
*Strong WIFI performance
*Digital stabilization provided by recent firmware works great
*Solid build quality with rubber like feel for better grip
*Includes surprisingly good quality mini tripod that the selfie stick can attach to extending the height
*Includes nice pouch providing adequate protection from scratches while in a pocket

Meh:
*Good 360 photo quality relative to other 5.2K cameras, but inferior to cheaper offerings like Theta and Xiaomi Mi Sphere)
*Average battery life (specs are accurate ~40 minutes in 5.7K and an hour in 4K)
*2.5K live streaming to Facebook and YouTube (if your into that sorta thing)
*Doesn’t have a feature like Fusion’s Overcapture, but can easily be replicated if not better with 3rd party video editing software

Cons:
*In-camera stitching limited to 4K and mediocre in quality
*Requires costly class 3 Micro SD cards to record smoothly in 5.7K
*Lacks sensors like GPS, accelerometer, barometer
*Not water resistant
*Not shock proof
*Voice controls are nearly useless, you have to be right by the camera to work

Overall:
This is undeniably the best value 360 camera currently on the market with video quality rivaling, if not surpassing, those that cost twice as much. This doesn’t mean it is the best camera choice for everyone interested in 360. To benefit from 5.2K and over cameras you really need to have a computer with a minimum of recent generation i5 processor and dedicated graphics card to reasonably run stitching software on highest resolution videos necessary to take advantage of the superior video quality offered. Additionally, 5.7K videos eats up a lot of space. We’re talking about a GB per minute of recording, so plan on buying some external hard drives. Sure, you can just record in 4K and playback on your phone without any of the hassle, but if convenience is your main priority then save money going with the Insta360 One 4K or Xiaomi Mi Sphere. The current crop of higher resolution cameras also emphasize video over photo and slightly inferior to cheaper cameras like the Ricoh Theta S or Xiaomi Mi Sphere capturing photos, so I’d recommend looking at those if you’re more into 360 photos. When compared to it’s main competitors, I consider the Yi 360 VR as the lifestyle/family cam of the bunch rather than an action cam. The shockproof, waterproof and oodles of sensors offered by the likes of the GoPro Fusion and Garmin Virb are far better suited to match the demands of the adrenaline junkies out there. However, if you want to best relive your Disney vacation, capture all the kids opening their Christmas presents at once, post an online walkthrough of a home your selling…etc., then you won’t find a product that does it better within an $800 price range.

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3D Printing Professor

YouTube Streaming, Easy Recording, but no longer supported by the manufacturer

Reviewed in the United States on July 27, 2019

Verified Purchase

Be warned when you purchase this camera. The manufacturer no longer supports it. The software for editing and running it on your computer is no longer available on their site for download. However, if you go to the facebook group for this camera, the community has kept that software available for use.

That said, with the mobile control app still available, this is a perfectly functional camera. I've used cameras that when you connect to it's wifi it disconnects your normal wifi. This one doesn't do that, or if it does it's very polite about putting it back when you're done. With the app you can connect the camera directly to wifi and and even stream directly to YouTube with it. It's remarkable.

I disagree that the on the fly stitching is as seamless as others are saying, but maybe that's because I'm using it in an enclosed environment, and maybe it gets better at distances greater than 6 feet in either direction. But for my purposes, it's really good.

It doesn't have the stabilization of more expensive 360 cameras I've used. And it's a little heavier. But that's the only compromise for the price.

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Elaskanator

Much better features than Samsung Gear VR but 5.7k video is too strong for modern computers

Reviewed in the United States on July 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

I love the OIS feature (stabilization) as half my uses for the camera would be impossible otherwise (I'm not mounting a gimbal AND this camera to my drone!). The "optical flow" stitching is also much better to handle parallax than other software does, such as Samsung Gear VR (I spent a long time compensating for this using some crazy Adobe After Effects editing, since giving people double-vision is not good watching the concert master's (1st violin) bow).

The 5.7k resolution is great to have, but my computer still struggles with it (and YouTube isn't optimized well enough above 4K to not lag up a storm). Adobe Creative Cloud software also bottlenecks HARD the moment you use a VR effect (e.g. VR Rotate Sphere) because of shoddy hardware acceleration (it took me >50 hours to render a 1 hour video on a Ryzen 1800X and nVidio 980TI in 5.7k without doing anything special).

The USB audio adapter cable is pretty pointless IMO because it doesn't even connect to my H2n for ambisonics, and since it uses the USB port, it also prevents external power supply use. A big use case for me is recording and streaming classical musical concerts, for which the USB microphone adapter cable is 100% useless since the battery would die way too soon.

A note about streaming: I can stream at the max quality (6 Mbps I think) using a mobile hotspot and burn through 8GB of data in about 154 minutes (by my calculations it should take 3 hours for 8 GB at 6 Mbps; not too far off). Also, you can't use scheduled YouTube live streams because there is nowhere to input the stream ID to use in the smartphone app.

The second biggest negative is the smartphone app's image settings, which caused me to fail a recording because the preview image would not update with the new setting (me: "let's use the minimum ISO because less color noise!" result: unusable dark video). Make sure to toggle back and forth between a couple different screens to make it refresh. Also, for whatever reason, it now keeps defaulting the exposure setting to -2 eV which is really annoying.

The biggest negative is how the camera firmware handles data corruption. BEWARE that if you try to stream over a wifi network that redirects to a terms of use page (or when your data plan is gone and you get redirected to the "out of data" notification page) that it really screws with the camera, requiring a purge (read: reformat) of the microSD card (probably the database file is corrupted). The symptoms include: 1) A REALLY long save time after taking a video or picture, or 2) the camera turning off immediately after powering on. I've also had it tell me 3) the sd card is too slow (of course, after starting recording and taking off on a drone to realize half an hour later nothing was recorded).

A surprising positive is that it went for a dozen minutes underwater on accident last night and seems to be working just fine today after spending the night sitting on top of a dehumidifier. It remains to be seen if it will continue working however.

One final negative is the stitching software that 1) does not support display scaling (super tiny UI on a dense 4k monitor) and 2) makes you individually set stitch settings per file (it splits files every 4 minutes in 5.7k (the splitting is perfect however with no gaps or double frames)), and 3) OIS stabilization across split video files requires manual reorientation of subsequent files so they all line up. It also takes a LONG time to stitch 5.7k at max quality, and only uses up to 8 CPU threads (but I won't fault it on that).

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Eric Dainton

Finally, a 360 camera that "Just Works"

Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2018

Verified Purchase

I bought the Yi 360 specifically to use for creating 360 virtual tours of apartments. I work for a property management company and we use these tours to show prospective residents that are not able to physically visit our properties, but want to get a good sense of the space. I've been trying to find a good, affordable, easy to use 360 camera for this purpose for years. I have bought a couple of 360 cameras over the years besides the Yi 360 (original Ricoh Theta, and original Vuze) and the YI 360 has been the best I've used so far. The stitching is very good and very quick. For photos, from my experience, the stitching is much smoother than the experience I had with the Vuze (Vuze may have improved this but it was not good for me originally). The Yi 360 app is also very easy to use and I've had no trouble connecting the camera to my Android phone. To create our 360 tours, we use an online app called Paneek, and the files that we get from the Yi 360 work great.

In addition, I've had good experience with YI customer service. I dropped the camera, causing one of the lenses to scratch. The YI team was very responsive and helpful in getting the lens fixed for me.

Overall, if you are looking for a 360 camera that "just works" and is relatively affordable, the YI 360 should be a strong contender. We are very happy, we even went ahead and bought a second one because we liked it so much.

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Declan M.

No Support

Reviewed in the United States on December 29, 2019

Verified Purchase

I guess I should've paid more attention to the reviews for this camera. It worked the first 2-3 times I used it and that was it. It no longer connects to the app for me to retrieve my media. It says it connects to the wifi and that's where it ends. I restored it and did the available software upgrade, still doesn't work. I used the software on my computer to retrieve my media and haven't used it since. I couldn't find any online support/help which sucks. I'll be looking into another 360 camera and reading all of the reviews for sure.

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Steve360

Better than GoPro Fusion for my line of work

Reviewed in the United States on February 3, 2018

Verified Purchase

This camera is currently the highest resolution consumer 360 camera for VIDEO and works best for what I use it for. The gopro fusion is right up there as well but as with any camera, it's important for the shooter to know how they need to use it first. For me its a back up to the insta360 pro so higher resolution is a must. Lighting and colors are as good as I can hope for from these small sensors and functionally it hasn't let me down yet.

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Twelvizm

Decent for the price, but has several issues.

Reviewed in the United States on June 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

The media could not be loaded.

I want to rate this higher, but the lack of Mac stitching software really is a huge drawback. Additionally when stitching in camera there’s a very pronounced stitch line as if the two camera lenses are slightly out of alignment. Image quality is decent, with the biggest drawbacks being signigfigant flaring that can cover a whole lens, not extending to the opposite lens, resulting in a very defined hard line at the stitch. Chromatic aberration is also an issue. Optically the Ricoh Theta S is better, but doesn’t have as high of resolution as this. Also, it’s low light performance isn’t anything to brag about. The advertised stabilizing doesn’t happen while the footage is shot, but is added afterward using the app or desktop software, which borders on being false advertising as this camera doesn’t stabilize its footage at all, software does it. Ultimately, I wish I would have spent a little more and got the better Garmin Virb.

I almost returned it, but decided that for my uses, it is good enough. I use it with a gimbal and mount it to drones and rc cars mostly. In my video practice 360 video is still only a kitchy gag.

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Tad

the support forum is garbage. It's been patrolled by webcrawlers and robots leaving ...

Reviewed in the United States on April 8, 2018

Verified Purchase

When I first started using it, I couldn't write much of a review. Now...here it comes.

1) At the writing of this...the support forum is garbage. It's been patrolled by webcrawlers and robots leaving their porn ads.
2) The user manual...is garbage. Try finding anything in the manual explaining the less obvious function of "camera calibration." Good luck finding much help on the editing software.
3) The editing software is laughable and the GUI design is hardly user friendly.
4) The GUI design of the android app isn't much better.
5) When I use the app on android to adjust the ISO settings...it's basically stuck. Good luck adjusting the ISO.
6) When I do try to calibrate it and it fails...if you try and back out of that option, it tries to calibrate on its own and won't let you back out. You have to exit the app and go back into it.
6) There is absolute no explanation/help/support of how to edit the files it produces in such software as Adobe Premiere Pro. You'll be stuck in their editing software for sure if you aren't an intermediate or advanced in the knowledge of this format.

I can't say much for other 360 cameras but at this point, I wish I never bought it. Mostly, it's due to the lack of support the company provides.

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