Lytro's first pro movie camera is designed for visual effects magic

While there are plenty of advanced digital movie cameras, most of them aren't really designed for the modern realities of movie making, where computer-generated effects are seemingly ubiquitous. You'll still have to bust out the green screen if you want to put those real actors in a digital world. Lytro might have a better way, though. It's introducing the Lytro Cinema, a movie camera built with digital effects in mind. Since Lytro's light field technology captures a massive, 3D picture of the environment (755 RAW megapixels at up to 300FPS), you might never need a green screen again -- you can accurately determine the objects you want to keep in a given scene.

The Cinema also gives cinematographers the rare chance to adjust camera settings after the fact. You can choose the focal point, of course (possible even in the original Lytro cam), but you can also adjust depth of field, dynamic range (up to 16 stops) and shutter speed. In short, you won't have to reshoot just because you weren't quite happy with the output. The master footage also makes it comparatively easy to adapt to different frame rates and video formats, like IMAX and TV broadcasts.

Don't plan on using one to produce your fan film any time soon. Rental packages start at $125,000, and there aren't mentions of plans to sell the camera directly. The Cinema is really meant for top-tier studios with giant budgets, not indies getting their first production off the ground. Even so, it might be a big deal -- it could not only save valuable post-production time, but give creators more freedom to experiment with and perfect their shots.