Lytro Illum: Lytro's New Light-Field Camera

A far cry from the toy-like appearance of its predecessor, the $1,599 Lytro Illum looks and feels like a genuine full-fledged camera meant for a more professional crowd. The innovation doesn't stop at just looks either, as the Illum is a much more serious effort at light field photography, with cutting-edge optics, a larger sensor and a whole lot of computational power that might make the Illum the most technologically advanced camera to land in consumer hands.

When Lytro first introduced its light field camera two years ago, it shook up not just the world of photography, but of technology in general. Bundled inside a tiny rectangular block was a groundbreaking image sensor that could capture millions of rays of light along with their color, intensity and direction -- a task that previously required hundreds of cameras and a supercomputer. That hardware, combined with some complex software, meant that you could not only get a 3D image from a single shot, but also had the ability to refocus a photograph after you take it. It's this latter trick that is arguably the Lytro camera's most identifying characteristic, and the one that put it on the technological map.  
More than just taking a good photo, however, Rosenthal and Ng believe that light field photography allows for living art. It's one of the reasons Lytro is also introducing something called Light Field Animations, which are video-like capabilities that essentially animate the effects of image refocusing. "If you think of how pictures work today online, it's as if we took our parent's photo albums, ripped out the 4-by-6 prints, and just shoved them up on the web," said Ng. "We're on this long-term journey of taking these advanced hardware and software capabilities to just make storytelling and photography more immersive, more interesting and more interactive." 

The Lytro Illum will be available starting July 15th for $1,599, which sounds expensive, but the closest professional camera with a similar lens will likely cost thousands more. And if you pre-order before that date, you can snag one for the introductory price of $1,499.

"If Camera 1.0 was film-based, and Camera 2.0 was the transition from film to digital, we're at Camera 3.0. It's about collecting very rich information about the world," said Rosenthal. "We're only just getting started. We can do much, much more in the future."