Virtual Reality Video

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Beijing time, November 6th morning news, YouTube released two new features for its Android app on Thursday, expanding the video website's support for virtual reality content and providing the largest platform for this new technology.

The app now supports virtual reality videos, a mode that gives viewers a more realistic 360-degree perspective of movies.

To watch such videos, users need to call up the VR video in the YouTube app: click the VR button on the video and place the phone on the Cardboard VR headset produced by Google's parent company Alphabet to get this viewing experience.

VR content creators can upload Cardboard-compatible VR videos to YouTube, and YouTube says it currently has about a dozen VR videos on the platform, including one from the "Hunger Games" movie.

YouTube also announced that users will be able to watch its vast library of videos in a relatively limited virtual reality experience, also using Cardboard, which YouTube said will simulate what users would see in an IMAX theater.

Neil Schneider, president of the Immersive Technology Alliance, a virtual reality trade group, noted that YouTube launched 3D video in 2009 and was also an early adopter of high-definition video.

“It’s not surprising that they’re adding VR capabilities,” he said.

Schneider expects high-quality VR content to explode quickly, but amateur content may be relatively scarce because the equipment required to produce VR content is often expensive.

But it's entirely possible that smartphones could offer VR recording capabilities, said Jay Iorio, a fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers who has created VR content for Google Cardboard and Facebook's Oculus Rift.

“The devices I use now will probably be what people will be using on their phones in a few years,” he said.

The Oculus Rift is scheduled to be released next year and will likely cost between $300 and $350, while Cardboard currently costs between $5 and $50.

YouTube said that the YouTube app that supports Cardboard videos is currently only compatible with the Android platform, and will be compatible with the iOS platform "soon".