Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide

by

LightFieldPhotobook.com

DISCLAIMER AND TERMS OF USE AGREEMENT You can give the Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide away to family and friends as long as you do not change any part of it. You CANNOT sell this Guide. The author and publisher of this Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide and the accompanying materials have used their best efforts in preparing this guide. The author and publisher make no representation or warranties with respect to the accuracy, applicability, fitness, or completeness of the contents of this Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide. The information contained in this Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide is strictly for educational purposes. Therefore, if you wish to apply ideas contained in this Guide, you are taking full responsibility for your actions. The author and publisher disclaim any warranties (express or implied), merchantability, or fitness for any particular purpose. The author and publisher shall in no event be held liable to any party for any direct, indirect, punitive, special, incidental or other consequential damages arising directly or indirectly from any use of this material, which is provided as is, and without warranties. As always, the advice of a competent legal professional should be sought. The author and publisher do not warrant the performance, effectiveness or applicability of any sites listed or linked to in this Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide. All links are for information purposes only and are not warranted for content, accuracy or any other implied or explicit purpose. Lytro is a registered trademark of Lytro, Inc. Lytro, the Lytro logo, Lytro light field camera and all other Lytro products and services are trademarks of Lytro Inc. Photos of the Lytro light field camera, screenshots of photos taken with the Lytro camera and graphics are taken from the Lytro website. This Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide is copyrighted by LightFieldPhotobook.com and is protected under the US Copyright Act of 1976 and all other applicable international, federal, state and local laws, with ALL rights reserved. No part of this may be copied, or changed in any format, sold, or used in any way other than what is outlined within this Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide under any circumstances without express permission from LightFieldPhotobook.com This Guide is Copyright 2012 LightFieldPhotobook.com

Lytro Camera and Light Field Photography Beginners Guide

What is light field photography? ....................................................................................... 4 History of Light Field Photography ......................................................................................... 4 What is Lytro?................................................................................................................... 5 Lytro camera specifications and basic info ...................................................................... 6 Lytro camera has an unusual design ...................................................................................... 6 Technical specifications .......................................................................................................... 7 How is Lytro light field camera different from a classic digital camera ................................. 8 First reviews of the Lytro camera .................................................................................... 10 Future of the light field photography .............................................................................. 11 Light field photography refocus after the picture is taken................................................ 11 Light field photo editing is the key ....................................................................................... 11 Light field photography meets 3D ........................................................................................ 13 Instructions on how to shoot with Lytro camera to get the best results ........................... 14 Basic instructions on how to shoot with Lytro camera ........................................................ 14 Focus on composition and depth of the photo .................................................................... 14 Wordpress plugin to include living pictures from Lytro.com on your blog ........................ 16 Where to go from here ................................................................................................... 16

What is light field photography?

Light field photography captures the photo in a whole different way than classic digital photography. With your good old digital camera (or a camera on your phone) you capture a 2D photo of whatever you are taking photo of. You can edit this photo later to make it lighter or darker, change the colors, or Photoshop it and change it a lot. But everything that you do, you are still changing pixels on a 2D photo. With light field photos this is different. A light field camera does not capture mere pixels, it captures rays of light and store the data about the light field in megarays (Lytro camera captures 11 megarays). How the light hits the objects in the frame, at what angle and with how much intensity. So, what good does that do? With the software available from Lytro you can manipulate the picture after it has been taken. And this manipulation is nothing like photo editing we know you can change the focus of the picture and refocus it AFTER it has been taken. This means a couple of things: No need to worry about your photos being out of focus (you can refocus later) Very fast (no auto or manual focus, the photo is taken instantly so there is no delay to focus the photo) No need to use flash (the camera captures the light in the surroundings)

History of Light Field Photography The idea of light field was first proposed by Michael Faraday in 1846, while the term light field was first used by Alexander Gershun in 1936 (more about history on Wikipedia). Light field photography in a way that is presented to us by Lytro started at Stanford University and if you are interested in the technology, check out the science behind this technology at their website.

What is Lytro?
Lytro is a startup company founded by Ren Ng who earned his Ph.D. at Stanford for his dissertation Digital Light Field Photography. He went on to bring this technology to the market and that is how Lytro was born. Lytro has released his first camera, simply called Lytro, to the market on February 29th 2012. Together with the camera, customers receive the software to download and manipulate the photos taken with their camera, and an account at Lytro.com where they can upload their photos and share them online.

Lytro camera specifications and basic info

The new Lytro light field camera is the main reason that light field photography is getting so much attention right now. It looks like it will go into history as the camera that transformed the world of photography completely. To get acquainted with the camera we have prepared an overview of its specifications and some additional information. Lytro camera has an unusual design The first thing you notice about the Lytro camera is the strange design, very different from the traditional digital cameras that we are familiar with. The shape of the camera follows the function of the camera. Light field camera uses a set of lenses that allow it to capture the depth of the light field therefore you need space to set all these lenses in the right positions. At the end of the lenses there is the Lytro light field sensor that captures all the light field data that is caught by the set of lenses. Behind the light field sensor there is the computer part of the camera, called the Lytro Field Engine which processes all that light field data previously captured by the sensor. Below is the graphic presentation of these three parts of the camera made by Lytro.

As we can see there is a technical need for a longer shape of the camera to set the lenses at the right places. This does not mean that the camera couldnt be shaped like any other DSLR camera out there with lens attached to the camera. But obviously Lytro decided to go for a unique design to make sure nobody can mistakenly think its just another digital camera.

The metal case and vivid colors the camera is available in red, blue and gray also help to make the design of the camera unique so there is no doubt everyone will recognize it right away. Technical specifications Here are the technical specifications of the Lytro light field camera taken from the Lytro website.

The only difference between the three models is that the Red Hot model features 16 GB of memory and it costs $499 while the other two models, Electric Blue and Graphite, feature 8 GB of memory and cost $399. Storage Type Internal flash drive. Technology Lens Controls Display Exposure Battery Lytro Light Field Sensor and Lytro Light Field Engine 1.0. 8x optical zoom; Constant f/2 lens. Power button: Shutter button; Zoom slider; Touchscreen. 1.46 in | 33 mm back-lit LCD display with glass touchscreen. Tap on touchscreen to set exposure. Long-life Li-Ion internal battery.

File Output Light Field Resolution

Light field picture file (.lfp). 11 Megarays: the number of light rays captured by the light field sensor. Includes a free desktop application for importing, processing and interacting with living pictures from the camera. It is built for Mac OS and requires Mac OS 10.6.6 or higher. A Windows application is in development. Produces HD-quality interactive, living pictures. Free storage for living pictures on Lytro.com, subject to the Terms of Use. (Internet access required) View and interact with living pictures on the Lytro camera as well as any internet-connected computer, smartphone or tablet supported. Version 1.0. This is the software that processes light fields to produce interactive pictures. Keep watching this space! Ultra-light anodized aluminum structural skin. Silicone Rubber. RoHS certified. 7.55 oz | 214 g 1.61 in x 1.61 in x 4.41 in | 41 mm x 41 mm x 112 mm Lytro Light Field Camera; Lens cap; Cleaner Cloth; Wrist Strap; 3.28 ft | 1 m Micro-USB cable for data transfer and charging. Fast charger; Replacement lens cap. (Separate purchase required)

Software

Picture Output Picture Storage Picture Viewing Light Field Engine Shell Grip E-waste Weight Dimensions Included Optional Accessories

How is Lytro light field camera different from a classic digital camera Besides from being the first commercial camera that captures the light field there are several things that make the Lytro camera different from the classic digital cameras that we know today.

The controls on the camera are minimalistic (and remind you of the Apple philosophy). There are only three buttons: the On/Off button, zoom button (slider) and shutter button. There is no flash because Lytro camera is supposed to handle well also low light scenes as it is able to catch the entire light field in the space. An at the end of the camera there is a 1.46 inch touchscreen display that offers functionality for viewing pictures, managing them and also some basic manipulation of taken pictures (refocusing, zooming). On every basic digital camera you have a plethora of modes and settings that you can set when taking a picture in different conditions (the question is how many times have you actually used some of them or have you rather just stuck with the auto mode). Lytro has none of these, the only settings you can choose is normal and macro. No need to focus. Because the camera captures the light field and stores the data of the light rays (it captures the data for 11 million rays of light) it gives you ability to change the focus after the picture has been taken without modifying the original picture focus can be changed again and again. It is very fast because it takes the photo the moment you press the shutter button. The reason for speed is the absence of focus. With no need to focus the scene (you will do that later on the software side) the camera can instantly capture the photo with no delay.

First reviews of the Lytro camera

There is a handful of reviews available at this time about the Lytro light field camera and there will be much more in the future. Here is a short summary of the most important points. The light field technology that camera uses is absolutely stunning and revolutionary. The ability to refocus picture after it has been taken is enough to be extremely excited about the camera and the potential of what we can expect from this technology in a couple of years is mind blowing. Easy sharing the photos online is one of the most important features of this camera as others can also play with the photo and refocus it online. But on the other hand, the actual photos taken with the camera are not as good as one would expect. The resolution is low, in some light conditions photos are not good and if there is nothing to refocus on the photo a low budget digital camera is actually better. With the Lytro software improvements users can expect to be able to better manipulate their light field photos (even the ones they have taken in the past) and thus improve the quality of the photo and the amount of manipulation that is available. We will be adding new reviews to our website so please check them out at http://www.lightfieldphotobook.com/news/the-first-lytro-camera-reviews.

Future of the light field photography

Light field photography will be an enormous hit in 2012 and its popularity will only grow in the future. This may seem as a bold statement for new technology that is not even freely available in the market and that hasnt been thoroughly tested yet. But we feel pretty confident about it and in the next article well take a look at some arguments about it. Light field photography refocus after the picture is taken To have the ability to manipulate the photo with just one click is very appealing to all camera and computer users there is no need to be a Photoshop master, anyone can do it. And you even dont have to worry about pictures being out of focus or being taken a moment after the one you were planning to capture (very common when photographing children, animals, events etc.). But what we have seen so far is just the tip of the iceberg. We are confident there is a LOT more to come in the following years. If you are intrigued, read on. Light field photo editing is the key As you have probably already figured it out, taking the photo with light field information is only the first half of the equation. The real game changing experience lies in the ability to manipulate the picture with all the data that has been stored. Instead of pixels (or megapixels) we now have rays of light (11 megarays in the case of the Lytro camera to be precise). So what can we now do with all these rays? With the right photo editor, we can do miracles. Just to get some perception about how much data is stored in 11 megarays. According to Wikipedia, the size of the photo once converted into jpg format will be 10801080 pixels (1.2 megapixels). Whoa wait a minute. Only 1.2 MP? You can hardly find a camera in a mobile phone with such a low resolution. Where is the point? First, lets take a look at how big are the files, that are made with the Lytro camera. On their website it says that a camera with 8 GB of memory can store 350 pictures thats approximately 23 MB for one picture. 1 MP photo takes up less than 0.5 MB, whats with all the rest of the data? Well, here is the trick the data stored is not pixels, its rays of light. We all know that with Photoshop or some other tool you can manipulate classic digital photos and change them a lot, pixel by pixel. But with light field photos you dont

manipulate pixels, you manipulate rays of light. What this means is perhaps best said on the Lytro blog: when you interact with a light field picturefor example, when you refocus ityou arent changing the captured light field data, but are instead changing parameters that control projection of those data to the sequence of 2-D images that you see And also: Because the megaray data are included, the desktop application can generate any of a wide range of projections of these data, including refocused images, or stereo image pairs for viewing on 3D displays. The point of the light field photography is in these two quotes with special light field photo editing software you are able to change the perspective of the picture and how it is presented you dont watch the fish through the glass of a fish tank anymore you are in the fish tank. Light field photos are made for watching and sharing on a digital media, this is where they break the barriers of traditional digital photography. Refocusing the photo afterwards is a great feature and a fantastic selling point, but the really crazy stuff will start to happen once we go deeper. Lytro will provide its customers with a desktop application that will allow photo editing of their living pictures. But its only a matter of time before some third company releases their own light field photo editor that will allow users to manipulate photos as never before and this is, in our opinion, the most exciting part of the light field photography that will be here very soon. Better light field sensors for larger, more detailed pictures With all the excitement about the light field photography we must not forget that the Lytro camera is the first light field camera that will be released. With new versions of their camera or cameras from other manufacturers (if Lytro will license the technology) there will undoubtedly be many improvements to the device. Certainly there will be better and more capable light field sensors which will capture even more rays of light with even more data all resulting in larger pictures once exported (way over 1.2 MP) and even more options for manipulation of photos.

Just like with any new technology the newer versions of devices bring new and improved features, better quality, more options the same will happen with light field photography. Light field photography meets 3D We have already mentioned in a quote that living pictures will make it possible to create stereo image pairs for viewing on 3D displays. Its the natural next step really. Once you have all that huge amount of light ray data stored it is only a matter of filtering and presenting all that data to create different projections. Imagine viewing your holiday photos in 3D and literally sitting amidst the pyramids once again in your living room because of the photos you took with your little light field camera.

We will wrap up with article right here before we go too far into the future. We hope you have cached a glimpse of what will hit the world of photography very soon and how exciting it is going to be. If you are intrigued about the light field photography, please follow our website LightFieldPhotobook.com as we will continue to provide news and insight articles on this topic.

Instructions on how to shoot with Lytro camera to get the best results
Lytro camera is in a way classic digital camera, it features a shutter button, zoom and a digital display. Taking pictures with it is pretty straightforward, you literally aim and shoot. After you have taken the photo you can check it out on the display and move on to taking another photo. However, as you already know, there is more to it than that. With the unique ability to capture the light field of the space instead of the plain 2D image, we have the ability to manipulate the photo after it has been taken in a way that was never before possible. Changing the focus of the photo afterwards is nothing short of revolutionary. But to take full advantage of this feature you need to think about it. Basic instructions on how to shoot with Lytro camera First of all, forget about the focus, you will deal with it later. The key to light field photography is depth of your scene. If you take a photo of objects or people who are all at the same distance from the camera, there is no need for any special instructions. Find the composition and fire away. But know that in this case there will be not much fun doing the refocusing of the picture (there is no harm in that of course). If you want to fully explore the light field photography, search for scenes where objects or people are at different distances from the camera. For example, if your fiance is standing in front of the United Nations building in New York, make her stand at the middle distance from you and the building or closer to you than the building. This way when you refocus the image, the effect will be much more dramatic. Or make her stand behind the statue of a knotted gun in front of the same building and you will get three layers of depth in your photo that you can refocus and get a really cool picture. Focus on composition and depth of the photo Depth of the objects in your photo is essential, but so is composition. You have to think about how the objects or people or animals or whatever you are shooting are placed in the frame. The best light field photos feature objects at various depths that are positioned neatly in your frame. This way you can refocus on different areas of the picture and as you

do that various parts of the photo become alive. Nobody expects it that you will nail it the first time you do it, just practice a little and Im sure you will get the hang of it soon. And the most important advice that holds true for almost everything dont over complicate. If you see your dog, or your child or anyone else doing something you just have to take a photo of, just shoot. The speed of the Lytro camera is one of its most important advantages which will help you capture moments that a classic digital camera might miss because of the auto focus taking its time. These basic instructions on how to shoot with a light field camera are here to help you get started. There will be more tips, tricks and advice on shooting with the Lytro camera on our website, so please visit http://www.lightfieldphotobook.com/category/classes.

Wordpress plugin to include living pictures from Lytro.com on your blog

To help you easily include the photos uploaded to Lytro.com (yours or from other photographers) to your Wordpress blog, we have created a free plugin that makes the job very easy. You just drop the URL of the photo to the page or post you are writing (as you do with Youtube videos) and the living pictures will automatically appear on your blog so your visitors will be able to interact with them. Find the latest version of the plugin at http://www.lightfieldphotobook.com/wordpress-plugins/embed-light-field-photos

Where to go from here

We hope you have received enough information in this guide to get you excited about the light field photography, which will very likely change the world of digital photography as we know it in the coming years. To get more information and news about the Lytro camera, light field photography, instructions on how to shoot with the light field camera and everything else related to this topic, please visit our website, where we provide free insight information:

LightFieldPhotobook.com

March 2nd 2012