The Lytro Illum is Lytro’s second commercially available light-field photography camera. While their first was a capable test production that was made available to the public, the Illum pulls out the stops to help professional photographers create eye-catching images that were made for the digital world. The Lytro Illum invites photographers to shoot the world in three dimensions.
A quick primer on Light-field photography.
The technical aspects of photography are pretty straight forward; a sensor captures light on a flat plane allowing us to capture the position, color, and intensity of light as it passes through a lens. Light-field photography does the same but also captures the angle that light hits the sensor allowing you to manipulate the focal plane, perspective, and even create 3-D images all from one source file. Light-field photography is not a new concept per se but Lytro has created the first consumer ready handheld light-field cameras and that’s huge!
Light-field photography forces even the most seasoned photographer to completely rethink the way they create a photograph. All the elements of composition still apply: you’ll be conscious of leading lines, negative space, depth of field, needing an interesting subject, etc. but you’ll also have to think about all these elements with respect to where they exist in a three-dimensional plane.
The Illum has plenty to offer for adventurous pros that have an eye for creating Living Pictures, pictures that exist on a three dimensional plane where you can refocus on your subject(s) or completely change the perspective or viewing angle all from the same base image.
Hands-on
The Illum will make you think differently about what’s possible in your photography. The camera itself has a very sci-fi/hi-tech design and feel to it. It is a single lens system with a 30mm-250mm f/2.0 lens that comes to an extra minimalist body on the business end. It’s sharp, sloping lines give it a look of heft and rigidness that’s almost alien compared to the bulbous curves of a traditional DSLR-styled body.
The first thing you’ll notice when picking up the Illum is just how light and comfortable it feels in your hand. Those rigid and sharp lines betray the balanced grip it offers – even if you have larger hands. The controls are surprisingly familiar – there are two jog dials, one below the shutter and one just by where the thumb rests to give you control over exposure, shutter, and ISO (depending on the mode you’re using) all without having to take your eyes off your subject. There is a crisp 4-inch touch OLED that is bright enough to use out in sun and that’s important considering this is the only way to access and make changes to the camera’s mode settings, call up the playback feature, and share to your phone via the Lytro iOS app (sorry, there isn’t any Android support at this time).
The similarities between the Illum and your traditional camera system end here; you noticed there’s no mention of controlling the camera’s aperture settings, that’s because the Illum shoots every shot wide open at f/2.0. You read that right, every shot. Wide open. The reason behind this is the whole crux of light-field photography, once the shot has been recorded the sensor holds on to all the light data – brightness, color, direction, position – and lets the processor break the shot down into slices on a focal plane. In layman’s terms, this means that by shooting wide open the camera can create slices in the image RAW to focus at the camera’s full aperture range from f/1.0 (through a virtual processor) all the way through to f/16. This will transform the way you think about composing your images. For example, if you were to frame a bride and groom in a shot, traditionally you’d select the subject of your image and isolate them. The LytroIllum gives you the tools needed to create something completely different: you can isolate one of your subjects and transition into a final image where everything is in sharp focus. You can also play with perspective by rotating the image slightly to create a 3-D like effect.
To help you compose your shot, Lytro’s focusing system splits the in-focus range by color – blue (foreground) and orange (background). The focal metering system is reminiscent of a histogram and works much in the same way. The larger spikes within the blue & orange band indicate which objects will be in focus and determine their perceived depth on screen. Using this foreground/background system is the tool you’ll need to master in order to make some truly eye-catching images.
Lytro knows that these data rich and non-static (hence, “Living Pictures”) and printing them alone would not do them justice; that’s why Lytro has made sharing your Living Pictures an essential component of the Illum and the Lytro desktop and mobile apps. From the app you can upload to Lytro’s servers where they give you a generous unlimited storage plan just for signing up. Sign up and you’re ready to share to other social sites (Facebook/Twitter/Pintrest/500px) or you can choose to share a link or embed onto your site. You can also export your Living Pictures as an .MP4 file in either 1080p or 720p high-definition at various frame rates. You’ve taken the time to create an exciting image, why not ensure that it gets the eye-popping response it deserves.
By now you’re probably asking if this is the camera system for you. The short answer is that Lytro isn’t trying to replace your existing workflow, instead they’re looking to add value to the images that you create that are meant to live on the web. If you’re creating images for editorial, a live presentation, a web slideshow, or adding a unique take on wedding photography, the LytroIllum is flexible and light enough to carry along with your traditional gear to present your clients with a fully interactive finished product that can get more clicks, more likes, and more accurately capture the energy of a moment than ever before. For the enthusiast photographer, the Illum can be the tool to help your work stand out from the rest if you’re pioneering enough to tackle light-field photography.
Lytro has put together a solid camera with a truly unique approach to photography. It’s a disruptive take on the art of making a photograph that harkens to the company’s Silicon Valley roots. From our quick take on the Illum, we’re more than happy to make a little room for it.
