VideoOnInstagram
Latest
The After Math: Samsung's big Premiere and Instagram's video debut
Welcome to The After Math, where we attempt to summarize this week's tech news through numbers, decimal places and percentages. This week's been arguably less hectic than the last, but both Samsung and Facebook decided to up the tempo on Thursday. The Korean hardware maker announced a stack of new hardware, from tablets to cameras to desktop PCs, while Facebook's Instagram went toe to toe with Twitter's Vine, announcing a new video-sharing feature. On the very same day, Tesla had something to show, deftly switching batteries on its Model S faster than you'd be able to fill a gas tank. There were, however, six other days to the week, and we've pored over all of them for this week's numeros.
Video on Instagram hands-on
Facebook's Video on Instagram is undoubtedly riding on Vine's coattails, but is it any good? We gave the app a quick shakedown on both Android and iOS, and it's safe to say the answer is "yes." Basic video browsing and capture are about as seamless as on the Twitter-owned Vine service, with a few tweaks: Instagram won't auto-loop videos, and those 15-second clips allow for a little more creativity. It's only once you dive in that you notice the truly noteworthy differences, however, and we'll explain them in our full hands-on after the break. %Gallery-191985%
Facebook announces Cinema stabilization for Video on Instagram: iOS version only (update: more details)
If you somehow haven't heard, today's big Facebook announcement was Video on Instagram, and to accompany that news the team unveiled Cinema stabilization, meant to improve the quality (read: decrease the wobbliness) of your 15-second clips. Android users, take note: the feature is only available on the iPhone 5 and 4S, though we imagine it could it is slated to appear on Google's mobile OS later down the line. For now, it's iOS only due to the difficulties of dealing with Android device fragmentation Instagram founder Kevin Systrom explained that the technology was created with input from "cinematic experts," and we definitely noticed the difference in the before-and-after demo on stage. In scenarios such as filming a kid riding a bike, the stabilization seemed to tamper the jerkiness that inevitably comes with moving shots. The feature is enabled by default, but pressing the camera icon (seen above) will turn it off. iOS users can try out the new functionality by clicking through to the App Store below. Update: We just got done chatting with some of the Instagram engineers and got to learn a bit more about Cinema. Turns out, it took the work of four or five engineers to make the image stabilization feature a reality. According to CEO Kevin Systrom, Instagram already has one patent for the technology powering Cinema and there may be more IP to come out of the feature. Not surprisingly, that's why we couldn't get any more information about Cinema, but we were told that more will be revealed as the technology's legal protections are solidified. So, keep an eye out folks, as Cinema's secrets will eventually, some day, be revealed (we hope).
