04/03/2017 Click - Short Edition

We are about to put a whole new spin on the world of mobiles.

We are at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona -

the big show devoted to phones, tablets and all things mobile.

We're a bit behind schedule, but we're going to get there.

Although, if we look a bit distracted, it is

because we are preparing for a rather

It is not that we are not interested in the floating displays,

connected bus stops, flash cars, smart shoes,

It is just that we are about to bash out something

Last year, we filmed an entire programme in 360 degrees,

allowing those watching in virtual reality to look around the fantastic

locations simply by turning their heads or their phones

You really feel like you have been teleported into the situation.

Not only that, but these days, we also have the ability to stream

So imagine that, the next time we send a robot to the moon,

if it has a 360 camera on board, then we can all put on a pair

of goggles and actually feel like we are there, too.

And so that is what we are doing today, getting ready to go live

Not to the moon, admittedly, but to a place that is still

So here we are in the massive Mobile World Congress.

Eight enormous halls of madness and noise,

as everyone tries to launch their product with maximum

But these days this event is not just about mobiles,

Since you can use a phone as a VR headset, many companies have opted

to up the excitement by strapping people in and hurling them about.

Yes, folks, VR can be totally immersive, if you have your

And I don't even want to think what kind of experience this

But going live in 360 is less about the headset and more

about the kind of camera equipment you can and cannot use.

You are currently watching me through a Nokia Ozo,

which is a professional 360 camera with a professional pricetag

to boot - about 45,000 US dollars, or 40,000 euros.

It has eight lenses all around the sphere, which means not only can

you can see in all directions, but it can also shoot in 3-D

because that combination of lenses allows it to process

What is really weird is it has this enormous battery pack at the back,

which you think would be in shot, but actually this thing has a blind

And what they so is they just get that almost-360 view

and stretch it around like that.

Modern 360 cameras will stitch the scene together themselves

in real time, automatically wrapping that weird,

warped video into a sphere around your head,

and that is what enables them to go live.

Now, if you wanted to stream the full 360 view from the Ozo,

you are going to need some extract kit.

Two dedicated hardware boxes, and an internet upload speed

And, at a trade show like this, we are not that lucky.

I think we have to accept that it's early days.

To get really high-quality, ideally stereoscopic video,

so you really can look around and feel a sense of depth,

and feel that you're there, is going to take a while.

There are bandwidth problems, and just having the equipment that

can transmit and that amount of data,

the picture gets rendered according to exactly where you're looking.

It's going to take a while to get it sorted, but we're starting there.

We are going to be doing two lives in 360, testing two different

cameras and this is no mean feat because as with last year's 360

show, we are coming to this before the manufacturers have

So, to get good pictures, good sound, and a decent bit

of interaction with the audience, we are having to hack together

various bits of kit, and hope no-one trips over

My microphone goes into a transmitter, which goes

into a receiver, which goes into a box, which plugs into another

box, and then we've got, like, a half a mile of ethernet cable,

which is going to a network access point, which is hidden

The first 360 camera we are using is the Orah 4i -

four lenses which between them can shoot the 360 video

Although it is important to note that this is the resolution

The viewer only sees a part of this as they look around the scene.

At the moment, it's not showing us anything that we want.

It's a bit blurry, but we're going to get better.

It was our very first attempt, so things were bumpy on the run-up

We were supposed to go like -15 minutes ago.

That said, it seemed to hang together, and viewers on our YouTube

360 channel got to find out a bit more about a car that's planning

Yes, it has a gas turbine engine from the Typhoon Eurofighter.

The gas turbine is for your below 800mph manoeuvres and then

the rockets fire you up, give you the kick to over a thousand.

Now, streaming such a high-quality picture takes a lot of data,

hence we had to use a fat, wired internet

connection of about 10 megabits per second.

But, for our second attempt, we went commando.

The Ricoh Theta S is the camera we used to shoot the 360 helicopter

It is a small hand-held stick with two fish-eye lenses.

Its full view is only 2K, the same as a normal high-def

picture, so the part you see in virtual reality is much lower

resolution but that does means it is possible to stream the video

live over the mobile network, which is what we did,

To give them a taste of what it is like to be so close

Very soon, Ricoh is releasing the Theta R which has a few

upgrades, including more connectors, expandable storage, and it

will do the stitching in the camera itself,

rather than needing a computer to do all the grunt work.

For now, though, we were pretty happy with our little experiment,

and very soon there will almost certainly be more

fully integrated kits, to let us go live in 360 with much less bother.

When we went to up a glacier and to the Large Hadron Collider

to film those in 360, we used six GoPros strapped together

We then had to stitch that footage together manually,

using a powerful computer and software, and many, many hours.

Well, since then, GoPro has released the Omni,

which is a case in which six GoPros fit.

It has one remote start for all six cameras,

which is good, and it also comes with a box that does

And in a couple of months' time, GoPro says it is going to release

an update which allows you to do that live.

And, if you want to create your own 360 videas,

this tiny camera by LiFi plugs into your Android phone.

The videos are not live, but the stitching is quick,

and you can share it easily on your social networks.

Right, what else is hot at this year's MWC?

Here's Stephen Beckett with a round-up.

Incredibly, at a convention with some of the world's biggest

phone manufacturers hawking their newest and shiniest devices,

this is the phone that everyone is talking about.

Finnish start-up HMD Global has resurrected a scintillating piece

of nostalgia, with a reboot of its Nokia 3310.

HMD licensed the Nokia phone brand at the end of 2016.

The close to indestructible handset, with a seemingly infinite battery

life, has been given a new lease of life,

with modern curves, jazzy colours and, of course,

BlackBerry has also gone back to basics with a new flagship phone

It has a physical gesture sensitive keyboard that hides a fingerprint

And that is not the only slice of nostalgia here at NWC.

Samsung is getting in on the action, too, with this classic Norris

pencil, although I would not

sharpen this particular one because there is quite a lot

of digital stuff in the end, to allow

Google would much rather you talk to your devices though,

It has announced its personal assistant, Google Home,

will finally be available for sale outside of the US,

and by May, in the UK.

And, in another new attempt to dominate the AI market,

the company also said it will roll out its voice-activated digital

assistant to all android phones running Marshmallow and Nougat.

Until now, it has only been available on Goggle's own Pixel

That is, apart from Huawai and Lenovo mobiles.

Those are set to use Amazon's Alexa instead.

Lenovo's upcoming Moto Z will get its assistance smarts

through a snap-on back, which they're calling a moto mod.

Others, though, are ditching customisation.

LG launched its new flagship G6 phone without the modular capability

The company say its customers do not fancy forking out for extra parts.

The LG G6 also knocks the traditional aspect ratio oyt

of the park - the screen is 18x9 - twice as tall as wide.

Smartphones have traditionally been 16x9.

And that is it for the shortcut of click at NWC in Barcelona. A full

version is available online now. And let us know what you think of our

attempt at a 360 degrees episode. To be kind. Thank you for watching, see

you soon.