Startup company, Opal, has announced the Opal C1, a smartphone-shaped DSLR-style webcam. Opal is made up of former Apple, Beats, and Uber employees who claim that their device will be “the first professional webcam” available. Currently in private, invite-only beta, the Opal C1 is essentially a big rectangle with a mirrorless 7.8mm 4K Sony sensor, a microchip capable of making “4 trillion operations per second,” and a pair of beamforming microphones (dubbed MicMesh) for capturing high-quality, noise-canceled sound.
The Opal C1 is made with Macs in mind. While users are free to use third-party software like Nvidia Broadcast, Opal’s own C1 software is “made exclusively for Mac.” This software is where you will find the camera’s ability to blur the background or use facial recognition to touch up and filter the image, so it is a pretty hefty exclusion for PC users. The Opal C1 webcam aims for DSLR levels of picture quality, and with a price tag of $300, it is far less expensive than connecting a standalone DSLR to your computer. It also promises a 4K, 60 fps sensor with a 78-degree field of view, so it’s specced to keep up with existing webcam competition too. While no release date has been announced, those interested in the Opal C1 can add their email to a reservation list for a chance to purchase a beta version.
For more tech news, check out Xiaomi’s Smart Glasses.