Pass the GoPro

GO PRO MAX Video recording

You might wonder why GoPro has launched a 360-degree camera with fish-eye lenses front and back. You might be scratching your head, puzzled at why a company associated with fast-action video photography would do this.

The answer lies in the limitation that those shooting their jogging, biking, surfing and climbing face. While GoPro’s flagship, the Hero8 Black, takes wonderful high-resolution 4K video with hyperlapse and slomo options, you can’t pan and reframe shots as you go unless you hold the camera.

To address this, the GoPro Max has two fish-eye lenses that shoot 360-degree video around you. Each lens shoots a full 194 degrees. If you are into virtual reality, you can don a VR headset and relive the experience.

The major benefit, however, is being able to cut a two-dimensional video afterwards with GoPro’s editing software available for your phone or the web. At each moment, you can vary the slice of the 360-degree image in your 2D video. It means you control the direction and angle of the video at all stages.

GoPro Max 360-degree action camera

There are some limitations. While it takes 5.6K video at 360 degrees, the flat video you create is cut back to 1080p high definition. You don’t get 4K 60 frames per second (fps) available on the Hero8 Black.

The Max is larger than the Hero8 Black, more a square shape. However, it does attach to the same array of mounts that GoPro offers for other models.

Max has a bright LCD screen on the back that doubles as a viewfinder and control panel for selecting shooting modes and other settings, and it’s user-friendly. There’s six microphones for recording audio as you go.

Max is waterproof to five metres and GoPro throws in transparent lens caps to protect the lenses during fast action shoots. Max also offers GoPro’s “HyperSmooth” video stabilisation.

The camera takes 16.6-megapixel stills, offers 1080p live streaming and has GPS built-in.

Chris Griffith