Canon just announced one of the craziest looking lenses yet, but it serves a remarkably cool purpose. Tatsuro “Tony” Kano, executive VP and GM of Canon U.S.A.’s Imaging Technologies & Communications Group says “At Canon, we innovate so creators can push artistic boundaries, and this commitment to innovation is what led us to introduce the new RF5.2mm F2.8 L Dual Fisheye lens.

   As Canon’s first entry into the world of virtual reality image capture, the EOS VR System represents an important milestone in our company’s rich history as a lens manufacturer and welcomes a bright future for VR content creation”. This lens only works on Canon’s extremely powerful 45-megapixel full-frame EOS R5, but it is the first time we have been able to shoot 8K footage on-the-go in 180 degrees for virtual reality systems like the Oculus Quest. The lens has a focus distance of 7.87 inchers and the aperture goes from f/2.8 to f/16. This lens completely changes the game for casual film makers and any advanced professionals.

   Canon has also done everything in their power to make the switch from shooting regular 2D footage to new VR 3D footage as easy as possible. Canon is implementing plugins that could be easily installed into professional video-editing software like Adobe Premiere Pro, these plugins make the process of implement-ing 180-degree video instant, when it used to be tedious and painful.

   They also offer a new editing software called EOS VR Utility to allow users to streamline the editing process even more. Kano says, “Our goal is to make immersive storytelling more accessible for all.” If you want this sort of rig, it will certainly cost you. The lens alone is $2000, but the camera required is another $3,899, and that’s just the base price, most photographers and videographers like to have a battery grip, a stabilizer, and a UV filter, so tack on another $700-ish. That puts your grand total at around $6,600, which is an extremely high price for a relatively small audience.

   The world is not at the point where most people have the ability or desire to watch films in VR, not yet at least. Fortunately for Canon, Mark Zuckerberg plans to change that with Meta. This innovative, new lens will release in December and may be one of many steps into the future of virtual reality.